The scent of memories
by Skymin
Summary: Bryan Fury is a young boy who didn't have a lucky and peaceful childhood. His idolized father died leaving him and his wife alone. How the boy will manage to lead his life and who is he gonna meet on his road to become strong?
1. Chapter  1, The scent of chrysanths

Destiny, the only thing we can't control nor predict. We don't know our future or the things we're going to meet on our way. It ties people to each other and separates them at the same time. If you think that you have a control at your life, you're mistaken. One man has learned a very hard lesson of life.

-flashback-

-shattering pieces of memories, a lot of different faces can be seen, laughing and crying can be heard, all in mosaic way-

_'Mother!'_

_'Catherine!'_

A strong, male voice is heard.

_'Catherine, hold on! Don't die on me here! CATHERINE!'_

Another voice is heard.

_'Shit! We're losing him sir! C'mon Fury! Fury!'_

-the voices are fading, darkness is surrounding-

-one light stands out, it shines like a star-

_'Do you wish to see your past again, Bryan Fury?'_

A gentle female voice is heard now.

-a single jingling bell is heard as well-

A man's silhouette is seen. It's curled up, looking unsecure.

'_Yes', he stated, 'I do.'_

**Chapter 1, The scent of chrysanths**

'Bryney-'

'Bryney.'

'Bryan!'

-a kid's face can be seen now-

A boy at the age of 5 or 6 was sitting on the floor on a comfortable carpet and was playing with his favorite toys – army figures. His intensively blue, ice eyes focused in a moment on something else. Before him there was a standing female figure with her hands crossed on her torso, one of her feet tapping the carpet beneath. She was a little bit chubby, middle tall, having raven hair as the boy sitting before her eyes. Glaring him she made a step closer and finally let go of her serious expression.

'You sure love playing with toys, Bryney.', she stated smiling a bit.

The boy looked into her deep green eyes and grinned as well.

'Daddy bought them for me, right? I love everything he buys for me because he's my idol and I want to be just like him when I grow up!', Bryan replied both seriously and cheerful while holding his favorite toy tank in hand.

'Right right…', she smiled more and gently stroked his short hair.

The boy giggled a bit and blushed when felt a touch of his mother's hand. Looking curiously at the soldier toy he held, paused for a bit, being lost in his thoughts.

'Hey mom-', started quietly.

'Yes-?'

'When daddy will get back from work?', Bryan asked when poking the helmet with his finger.

'Let's see… Probably soon, why do you ask?', the woman smiled.

'Cause when daddy gets back from work he always tells me awesome stories! I can't wait to hear another one for today-', boy's eyes were sparkling with happiness and excitation. There was no doubt that he really means it.

The woman sighed and stroked his hair once more before heading up to the kitchen.

'Do you want to have dinner now or to wait a bit for your dad?, she asked while peeking inside the fridge.

'Imma wait for him, I just ate a chocolate bar in a meantime anyway.'

'Bryan! I told you to not eat anything before the dinner!', she frowned and gave him one of the lecturing looks that moms gives their children when they do something wrong.

The boy just looked down in shame but then peeked at his mother with a smile which couldn't help but to cheer up her a little bit. Shaking her head in disbelief she closed the fridge and looked through the kitchen's window. The weather was typical for early fall. The wind was blowing stronger than before and gave creeps to whoever forgot to put some warm clothes on. Suddenly she felt a strange knot in her stomach, like if something was telling her that something bad is going to happen soon. She ignored that feeling and decided to do some ironing before her husband gets back from his shift.

A few hours passed and the woman was just sitting in the armchair and gazing at the clock every 5 minutes. Something was definitely not right.

'He has never been that late…', she thought 'Something must've happened or… or…'

'Mommy, what's wrong?', Bryan gently pulled her by the skirt she was wearing and placed his hands on her.

She gazed at him quickly like if she was interrupted from something that took all of her concentration.

'Where's daddy… I wanna eat up now and hear his stories…', the boy looked down and then let his eyes meet with his mother ones.

'He's probably in a traffic jam or something, we shouldn't be worrying-', she forced herself to smile after that, 'If you're hungry, I can prepare one portion just for you.'

The boy nodded without saying a word and at the same time they heard the door bell rang for a short but many times. The woman get to the door and without checking the vizier she opened it. She saw what she wasn't expecting to see. A police officer that was standing before her now appeared to be one of her husband's pals from police. He looked at her with a rather morbid and hard look before finally escaping from the range of her eye contact.

'Miss Sarah Fury?'

'Y-yes, that's correct. What's wrong? Did you happen to see my husband?', with determination she tried to see into his eyes every time he tried escaping.

The man swallowed his salvia before finally letting these words out.

'…Your husband was killed during the operation, I'm sorry-', he paused, 'There was nothing we could do to save him.'

Bryan was looking at them, not really understanding what the other guy said. What he saw was his mother hiding face in her palms and sobbing while the man placed a hand on her shoulder. The boy understood though that something bad had happened. Something that he couldn't help. He didn't have much chance of analyzing the facts his own way as his mother embraced him strongly with teary eyes. He didn't even remember all the words she was trying to say to him.

'Your father.'

'Never.'

'Coming back.'

All he was able to do was to embrace her back and let her cry on him.

* * *

-small records of funeral can be seen-

-tape is damaged so all of the scenes are either blurry or covered with scratches-

-first there's a close up at Bryan's face and later at Sarah-

-saluting police officers and family friends can be seen gathered at the cemetery-

-the last picture shows a grave with the name EDWARD ANSEL FURY and a bouquet of white chrysanths-

* * *

A few months passed since the head of Fury family died. Because Edward was the only person working that time, Sarah and her only son was having a really hard time with being able to eat full meals or to pay the bills like for the warm water or electricity. Bryan was attending local elementary school and his mother was trying to find whatever job or paid tasks she could do. She didn't go to the university or college in the past because right after she finished the senior year of a high school, she married Edward and soon Bryan was born. She never felt bad about making that decision. She was happy enough to find a 4 years older partner who took care of her and treated her like a goddess on earth.

But he died.

Nothing can be changed.

Bryan has never cried because of his father's loss, at least not before Sarah. He felt responsible for his mother so he tried his best, getting the best notes at school as he could and never getting into fights. He was cleaning the tiny apartment room instead of his mom so she could rest after her work. One could say he was quite mature as for his age.

That day wasn't different than from the rest of the days. The black-haired boy was playing with his toys in the other room, waiting for his mom so they could eat dinner together. After another hour of waiting, his mother got into the flat and smiled at Bryan.

'Mommy! Welcome back home-', he nearly jumped on her and embraced tight before she could do anything.

She moaned a little bit but actually hugged him back.

'Hey- Don't squeeze me that much.', she said with a rather fragile voice and lightly stroked his hair.

Then the boy was able to see a few scratches and swollen parts on her face.

'Mommy, what's wrong..?', he looked at her with scared and concerned eyes, still refusing to let go of her.

Sarah let out a weak, sad smile on her face and gently caressed his cheek.

'A small accident at my workplace, nothing you should be worried about.', still smiling she gingerly kissed boy's forehead.

The soothing warmth of mother's kiss and hand were stronger than his doubts so he finally surrendered and smiled back, letting her to put off her coat and shoes and actually going to prepare dinner.

When she was sure that her little son was fast asleep, she sat in the armchair and let go of a cry that she was fighting back all this way. She couldn't cry in front of him.

'He's too young for that… He needs a proper childhood… All I can do is to be there for him, pay bills and make him able to finish the education… I… I shouldn't interfere with my adult problems in his young life. Everything… Will be okay eventually. I know that this boy will have a bright future before him… I'll bear with everything just to make sure he's happy…'

Sarah rubbed off tears from her reddish eyes and went to take a shower. She wanted to go to sleep as soon as possible to stop thinking about the past few hours. Before she got into her bed she heard knocking to the door and a loud ring. At first she thought that someone might have mistaken the flats or something or it was one of their neighbors that picked up a latter for her or something so she opened it and soon after was grabbed by her throat and pushed back. The loud smack eventually woke Bryan up as he moved on the bed and opened his eyes.

'Owww..! What… What do you want from me? Why you're here? How dare y-', Sarah pierced the tall man around the age of 40 with her glare but then got kicked off to the ground again.

'Watch your mouth you bitch. I'm just making sure you won't get a stupid idea about talking what happened today to the police. Remember what I've told you?', he raised one of his eyebrows and gave her a sly grin.

'… I do you sick bastard.', she spat and lifted herself with her arms.

'I like rude woman, they're so exciting when fucking the crap outta them. Too bad you didn't agree to my proposition. It would make the things easier for you…', the man faked a concerned tone of his voice and grabbed her face with his hand, 'Your face is quite pretty, you know…'

When she was about to break free from an upcoming kiss, the guy was hit by some hard object right in his head. After a second it was clear that Bryan threw one of his toys to help his mother. He was standing in the middle of the room with the teeth and fists clenched.

'Leave my mom alone!'

'-Oh? Isn't it your little bastard? Tell him to go to bed, he's gonna interrupt us and I think we need to talk more…', the man grinned in a meaner way just to squish her face with more power.

'I told you to leave her alone!', the boy rushed at them with one of his fists ready to deliver the strongest punch he could ever do.

'Bryan no-', Sarah was being pushed on the floor and before she was able to do something, the boy was already kicked hard in his belly.

'Just as I thought, like mother like son in this case. I warned you.', then another kick was deliver but this time right into Bryan's face.

The poor kid clutched the pained face with one and the belly with another hand while whimpering.

'Stop it! If you wanna hit someone, then do it on me!', the woman stood up on her legs and shielded her son with opened arms.

The man glared at her for some time and then decided to let them go. He walked away towards the door, giving Sarah a chance to hug Bryan and check if he's okay.

'But remember. Just one word to the police and you and your little son will taste my wrath. Money means more than justice in this world. Sorry beings like you don't have a right to stand before someone like me.', with those words he left the flat .

Sarah snarled and then moved her sight on the boy who's head was lying on her lap. She gently whipped off a blood strain from the corner of his mouth and caressed his red cheek. She was nearly heartbroken to see him in that state because of her.

'I'm so sorry Bryan… I'm sorry that I couldn't protect you… It's all my fault… I promise that he's not gonna hurt you anymore aga-'

The boy placed his pointing finger on her lips to prevent her from talking more. Swallowing his own tears he gave her the warmest smile he could in his condition.

'Next time, I'll be the one to protect you.'

The woman remained silent from the astonishment and then slightly nodded. She realized that she shouldn't hide anything from him. Instead of holding a 6-year old kid, she held a young man now.

* * *

More years passed by month and month, Bryan was getting bigger and stronger. During his summer break he was taking small tasks or collecting cans to gather as much money as he could so his mother won't have to work that hard. If not picking up cherries from trees, he was taking neighbor's dogs for a walk or helping old lady with emptying her trash bin. He wasn't complaining about that even for once. Always when he handed money to his mother he was smiling widely, giving her a sign to not worry about him. He didn't know though, that he should've been worried about her.

One time when he got back home with a money stuffed into his pockets, he rushed into the living room and spotted his mom lying on a bed.

'Hey mom, hey mom! Lookcha what I got-! Now we have enough of money to save on the warm water in winter time.', he said aloud while getting closer.

Then getting no response, he examined her more closely and noticed that she's all red on her cheeks and was sweating all over her body, wheezing horribly. He didn't even need to check to see to that she's having a strong fever.

'M-mom? You alright..? Mom..?', he gently shook her arms.

When he did that, she finally manages to open her sick-looking eyes and gazed at him.

'Yes it just seems that I've caught a cold or something. No worries-', she whispered and coughed rather strongly after that.

'Have you taken any pills yet? It doesn't look like one of these colds that go away by their own…', he gingerly took her hand and lightly squeezed it 'I can go to the drugstore and get some.'

'If you could, but don't buy the expensive ones-'

'Shhh. I'll get whichever I can. Your health is the most important now.', he grinned and then rushed to the nearest pharmacy.

When he got back, what he saw wasn't looking all that good. His mother was coughing up blood. Bryan didn't even get stepped forward the room, because he ran down the stairs to knock on neighbor's door.

'Oh, hello Bryan, how can I help you-?', the door was opened by an old lady.

'Please, can you call up for an ambulance? My mom… My mom needs to go to the hospital!', pleaded with teary eyes, fighting back with an urge to cry.

* * *

-hospital's building can be seen now-

Bryan was sitting beside his mom's bed at the Sutter General Hospital. She had put on oxygen mask that helped her with breathing and was connected to multiple IV bags. From time to time the boy was sniffing and gazing at her weak face with a pained heart. He was wishing her to be alright in mind when a doctor came to the room. It was a tall, black man looking rather tired, he was probably up from the very morning and now the day is almost ending.

'Do you know what's wrong with my mom now?', the boy looked at him with concerned and worried look.

The man nodded and gazed at the lying woman.

'Miss Fury, wake up.', he ordered with a strong tone that indeed made Sarah awaken.

Running with sight all over the white walls of the room, she finally spotted her son and the doctor.

'Yes?', she whispered.

'Do you wish him to hear what I'm going to say?'

Bryan pierced the man with his slightly annoyed glare in response.

'I'm her son, I ought to know that!'

'It's okay doctor, I can't keep on hiding things from him… This won't make it any easier.', she closed her eyes and squeezed Bryan's hand.

'As you wish ma'am, judging from the x-ray results we can say that you have pneumonia. A really nasty one but it's not just it…'

'It can be cured with today's medicine… right?', she asked.

'Yes but I'm afraid that if you're going survive it, another illness will come up and strike you.', he paused and then looked into her green eyes, 'You were infected with HIV virus and now you have AIDS that hasn't been treated at all.'

Sarah didn't say anything for a few seconds. She closed her eyes for a longer time while taking a deeper breath.

'… Mom?', the boy gently squeezed her hand and looked back at the doctor.

'How… How long?', she opened eyes, full of tears but despite them her voice wasn't trembling.

'I'm afraid that two, maybe three weeks at most… We can give you some medicine that might slow down the whole process but at your rate I don't think it will be much better anyway.'

Finally one of the gathered tears rolled down her cheek as she bit her lower lip.

'Did you know that you were infected with the virus? Didn't you see any signs of getting weaker?', the doctor looked at curiously, 'I wonder how is that possible. You don't use any drugs or sleep with random men, do you?'

'I… Was raped 5 years ago.', then she paused biting her lower lip a bit stronger, anger rising within her with every next second, 'But I didn't think that it was AIDS causing my weakness for the past few months. I was too busy thinking about earning money so my only son wouldn't be hanging around with an empty stomach.'

Bryan looked down for a while in shame and then moved his sight at the doctor who wasn't looking severely at all. Especially after what she said. He took a deep breath and turned away.

'I'm sorry miss… Well uhm, I'll tell the nurse to bring you your medicine. Take care.'

After that he left the room with a tensed atmosphere. The boy looked into her glittering eyes and then felt how his cheeks are getting wet from his own tears.

'Mommy…', he only managed a very quiet squeak when he buried his face into her chest and started crying.

'Oh c'mon Bryney… You're quite of a man… How could you cry…', she gently embraced him and kept him close trying to sound strong but even she was crying.

In a soundless way so he wouldn't be any more heartbroken. The woman fondly started combing his short hair with fingers in order to comfort him as much as she could. She thanked god that he didn't look at her face since that moment. Without even noticing she fell asleep with him and was finally free of all the thoughts that were weltering inside her head.

* * *

A few days passed since then. Sarah didn't need to wear an oxygen mask anymore but her condition didn't get better at all. She was getting weaker from the antibiotics and AIDS that was slowly killing her in a painful way. Now she wasn't even able to sit on her own. She kept on lying motionless in the bed and coughing. Waiting for the death to come. Bryan just got back from the toilet when he saw her gazing at him in a unusual way. Her big green eyes were now almost grey and looked smaller than before. She even had more visible wrinkles on her tired, pale face. Her raven glossy hair was now matt and her skinny body was nothing like it used to look. Finally she broke the silence smiling as happier as she was able.

'Bryan, can… Can you sit with me?', she asked.

The boy nodded and quickly sit on the chair next to her bed. Not wasting any more time she gave him another question.

'Will you promise me something?', she moved her hand to touch his cheek.

'Yes, of course- What is it?', he gently cupped it with his hands and brought close to his face.

'Can you be the policeman just like your father was when you grow up? Can you be a strong and proud man…?', her eye lids were now half closed.

Bryan nodded again and then noticed how his mother has closed her eyes.

'I'm so happy…', she whispered 'Your dad… he…'

'… Mom-?', the boy gazed at her, feeling unsecure.

'He's proud… of you… So proud…'

Then a very small tear escaped from one of her eye lids and she smiled even more. After that the machine that was supporting her life stopped to make any sounds. Scared, he accidentally loosened the grip and her hand fell on the bed, lifeless.

'Mother…?'

There wasn't any answer.

'Mom… Mommy…', now he whispered shaking now like never before.

'Mother!'

He screamed on the top of his lungs. Feeling hopeless and so powerless. He failed on protecting her. It was his fault.

-the picture of him screaming gets blurry with noises all over it-

-the last one focuses on Sarah's motionless hand and then everything goes white-


	2. Chapter 2, The scent of an allspice

First of all I want to thank **Arti144uno **for being the first person to review and also for the tips and for some grammatic help~ Sadly I don't have anyone who could sit before the text and point out grammar errors and such. Aside this site I post it also on some Tekken board but the people reviewing also don't seem to help. xD I'll probably spot them by myself and edit the chapter little by little.

Also I apologize in advance for making this chapter seem a bit boring and confusing. There were a lot of moments that I just wanted to write as fast as possible and move on for something more interesting.

Edit: The chapter is now re-edited by me and I removed all of the errors I spotted so I hope it's better to read.

**Disclaimer: I do not own Tekken or Bryan Fury. But I do own every other character that I created for the sake of this ff.**

* * *

**Chapter 2,** **The scent of an allspice.**

-the picture is back, showing a building made of bricks-

-the scene focuses on the double, entrance door and zooms quickly through the corridors to a certain room-

-there can be seen an adult man sitting on a chair before a huge desk, there's also a young woman standing-

The man looked into the papers that were laying on his desk for another brief time before finally speaking.

'We have a new kid here. His name is Bryan James Fury, 11 years old.'

The woman looked at him calmly with her dark eyes and placed one hand on her other arm.

'What happened to him?', she asked.

'Well… He has lived with his mother before she passed away in the hospital because of AIDS. He lost his father at pretty early age.', the man continued passing the papers to the her.

Before saying anything she looked at the picture of Bryan which was included with the papers. He wasn't looking happy. Well, nobody would be happy when losing the only relative.

'And Mr. Richards, your point is? Isn't he just like any other kid who lost its parents? I know that here we have kids that were abandoned till their remember their family but still…', she closed her eyes only to rise her head at her boss again.

'You see Hikari…', the man started after he stood out and went to the window, 'I know you're looking after a group of small kids but I think this boy is special.'

She glanced over the papers once again and sighed.

'You mean because he's coming to this orphanage as a 11 year-old kid?'

'Yes but not only that. Didn't you come to this orphanage at the age of 15? He's nearly 12 years old so it's not much of a difference between him now and you back then.', Mr. Richards looked at her again and then back over the window.

Hikari paused for a while. She just remembered the day when that tragedy happened and when she decided to stay here and work as a overseer. She wanted to say something but before she did, the man spoke.

'He's here.'

After that he walked to the woman and placed his right hand on her shoulder and smiled in a fatherly way.

'I hope you will look afte. I believe in you, Hikari. If you give this boy a chance I'm sure he will help you as well.', with that words he took away the hand and sat again on his chair.

Hikari sighed once again and then bowed before leaving the room. Part of her wanted to meet that boy and the other one would rather stay away from him. Could be because of the deeply hidden memories that she'd rather forget. She knew though that Mr. Richards was kind enough to let her stay here for free so she has a place to sleep and eat. That's why she still had a debt to pay, at least this is what she believed.

Bryan was looking down all the way, refusing to look into anyone's eyes since he was picked up from the hospital. He has just gotten back from the funeral. For all this time he was staying at kid's hostel. He got a chance to get some clothes and some of the stuff he needed from his home but still, a few toys didn't make him feel better at all. The perspective of living in an orphanage now seemed horrifying to the boy. After packing up he realized how few clothes suited for him. Sarah didn't have a lot of money so when his clothes were torn in some places she just patched them back or got used clothes from neighbors after their older than Bryan children. When he saw the building he felt even more miserable.

'We're here. Someone should pick you up and take you around the orphanage and show you your room I believe.', policeman patted the kid on his head and tried to cheer him up by smiling.

Instead the boy made a small but visible grimace on the face and walked right to the entrance door with a rucksack on his back and his favorite pillow under his armpit. When he was a few meters away from the door he noticed a middle-tall young woman with black hair and eyes looking at him with curiosity. Judging from her face she was half Asian and half Caucasian. She was wearing a short type of kimono influenced jacket and a pair of jeans. Her hair was tied at the very end of it so it was kept in pace. She had short fringe with longer bangs on the sides of her face. Seeing his puzzled face, she smiled at him and made a step forward.

'Hello, you must be Bryan, right? My name is Hikari Grasland, I'll be your foreseer, nice to meet you.', she slightly bowed.

The boy bowed as well looking tad confused. Then he made that kind of sad eyes at her. She knew them. That sight. After gazing into them she felt like if she had known him before.

'I'll be your guardian here, I hope you'll adapt to this place without any problems. We're all there for you-'

'As if-', Bryan passed through her without even looking back.

Hikari sighed feeling how her heart squeezed for a second. She knew that it won't be a really easy task. She followed him without a word and then took a deep breath.

'Want to know where is what and who is who?'

The boy pierced her with his ice-cold stare and answered her almost emotionless.

'I want to be taken to my room.', he demanded.

The woman gave him a sad look but nodded in agreement.

'Very well, follow me.'

After that none of them said anything for the whole way. When Bryan was leaded straight to his new room and he didn't even thank the woman in the end. All he did was to get out of her sight behind the door. Hikari looked down and then back at the door.

'We gave you your own room because we couldn't find anyone in your age, besides one boy with autism so we decided to not pair him with you…', she stated aloud so he could hear her.

She didn't get any response so she left from his room and decided to take a small break and to think of a new strategy.

* * *

It was dinner time at the orphanage. All the kids have gathered in the big dining room and sat by their age before long tables, chatting with each other and laughing. Hikari sat with her group of kids and talked with them as well, telling a few jokes to cheer up a small girl who dropped on her knee and damaged it a few hours ago. She loved taking care of them. She felt that she can cooperate well with young kids, just unlike with Bryan. She hasn't spotted him for the whole day since he came into his room. Then she decided to bring him his portion and to leave it before his door. She did as she thought and seemed happy about that. Bryan didn't answer her call for food so she left him alone again.

The next day his potatoes and roasted meat weren't even touched. Now that made Hikari wonder what happened. She knocked into his door several times with no answer and when she tried pulling the handle it appeared to be locked. The woman sighed heavily and decided to give him more time. Mr. Richard caught her on the corridor and asked about the boy. She lied to him that everything is fine and that they should give him more time to adjust to the whole new situation. The man agreed and was happy to find such a responsible guardian for him.

It was dinner time again and she hasn't seen the boy since yesterday. She tried to not think about him but his sad and cold eyes were almost haunting her in thoughts. When kids has started to take shower and then go to sleep she checked Bryan's room once again. To her surprise it was opened. When she peeked inside she saw the boy laying on the bed who was crying very quietly. Hikari felt really bad for him and sat next to him. She noticed that he was sleeping because he didn't seem to react. Then she slowly placed hand on his hair and gently stroked it.

'There there… Don't cry…', she whispered.

'Mommy…', the boy answered while still dreaming 'Mommy… I… I'm so sorry…'

'Why?'

'Because I couldn't… I couldn't protect you…', he answered quietly still sobbing and hiding his face more into the fluffy and comfortable pillow.

She didn't know what to say. She felt really bad for him. As she expected he was missing his mom a lot. Her loss was too sudden to him. He was still a kid who needed to look after him and to love him. Hikari placed a small and warm kiss on his temple and carefully covered him with a fleece blanket.

'It's okay now, I'm not angry at you.', she whispered and again stroked his raven hair in a soothing way.

'Mommy…', the boy wept silently and sniffed a bit.

'Rest well, tomorrow you have classes, you need to be relaxed and ready to attend them. You're strong enough to do your best.'

The boy slightly nodded and stopped crying, curling even more on the bed. All he wanted was to feel loved and understood. He was still biting his lip, feeling scared and left alone. Hikari wished he could be more open towards her or anyone else. That way they could help him overcome the pain. She left him after being sure that he won't cry anymore.

'Sweet dreams.', she whispered after standing up.

After that she closed the door and left the room. She slightly leant on it and sighed while looking down.

'He's really like her… Maybe I should let them meet some day.', she thought while looking back at the boy's room, 'He's not ready though.'

Shaking her head she left to rest and call it a day. She stretched out her muscles while yawning widely. One of the kids has spotted her and tickled her waist a bit. The woman nearly choked on laughing and tickled back the culprit while grinning.

'H-hey! Not fair!', the girl giggled.

'I've only returned the favor.', Hikari stroked her hair happily to cheer her up, 'Are you after showering?'

'Yep!', she nodded.

'Then go to bed now, a new day awaits you tomorrow.', woman requested calmly while looking at the girl.

'Okay, good night miss Hikari!', the girl has ran down the corridor to get to her room.

While looking back at her she smiled to herself and headed in the direction of her own room.

* * *

The next day happened to be sunny like before, even the kids weren't pulling out any pranks or be noisy. Hikari opened the window in her room to breathe the fresh air while examining the environment. The building was placed at the city's outskirts. There wasn't much traffic or noises made by neighbors or cars. Next to the orphanage there was a school for the kids from the whole district, including those ones from the orphanage. Luckily there weren't any reports about problems that they may cause. She knew that at some occasions, parents weren't happy to have orphans attending the same classes like their children did. She sighed heavily and closed the window.

'I wonder if Bryan will find any friends in the new school. From what I read about him, he didn't have any because of his difficult family situation.', she though while scratching her head a bit, 'Anyway I have to look after the kiddies first and then I'll think more about Bryan.'

The woman changed her clothes and then went jogging for a bit. After that she headed to the dining room for breakfast. The boy still wasn't there so she took his portion and placed it before his door as she did before. Hoping she'd tame him a little bit this way she smiled to herself and left to do some errands.

The boy ate the breakfast right after he heard her leaving. For some reason he wasn't fond of her at all. To tell the truth, he wasn't fond of being placed into an orphanage at all.

'Still better than living on the streets forever huh…', he thought to himself while wolfing down the muffin with poached egg on it.

But on the other hand he was finally able to eat full meals every day. He couldn't remember the last time he had poached eggs or something like this at all. He was that poor. But his mother was everything to him. He has never complained that they couldn't afford things that most of people do. As long as he was together with her everything was alright. But now she's gone. He was still able to recall her smiling face before his eyes. But after that he saw her, calmed by death, face lying in the coffin.

'Mommy…', the boy whispered while bringing palms to his teary eyes, rubbing them furiously.

'Hey kids, go to the main hall now, we're leaving to school.', the voice echoed in his ears as the person who said them walked right before his door as well.

Thanks to that he was about to snap out of his gloomy thoughts. He stuffed his old pencil case and notebook to the small rucksack he brought from his home and put it on his back. Before he even noticed he was sitting already in the classroom and listening to the boring in his opinion lesson. The algebra teacher was chubby Mexican-looking guy with round face that reminded him of a hamster. His previous one was a quite pretty and really nice woman who loved teaching more than everything else. Sadly he couldn't say the same about Mr. Suarez. He was the least sympathetic man he has ever met. That's why he already found his lessons that boring and unbearable so for the first time he wasn't taking any notes from the class nor paying attention. Bryan glanced at the students sitting before him. He was surprised to see that nearly 1/3 of the classmates came from the orphanage. Not that he could actually tell who's who, but the faces were familiar enough. He wondered why they were sitting only in one particular spot of the classroom. He slightly looked behind him to check if he was right.

'Hey you, pay attention to what I'm saying! _Mi dio_, what a _problemático_ kid.', the teacher stated while rolling his brown eyes and tapping the blackboard with the chalk in his hand.

'Uhuh, sorry mister.', the boy immediately sat properly and slightly looked down.

'Why am I apologizing to him anyway, he's such a bore…', he thought while faking that he's actually writing something in his notepad.

The lesson ended sooner than he thought and he only had two more classes before getting back to the orphanage. He'd rather stay there than attend boring classes. His own thoughts surprised him because he was a good pupil before. He wasn't an ace but he wasn't bad either. He was just a normal kid.

He was.

'When my mom was still alive…'

He furrowed and angrily scribed something down to unload his frustration into something. When he was doing it he heard a noise coming not too far away from where he was sitting.

There was standing a middle tall girl with ginger hair combed into to ponytails. She was wearing round glasses and was dressed into denim skirt and polo shirt. She was from the orphanage as well. Next to her there were three other boys. The first one has a fancy hairdo which was stylized with hair gel and was wearing a blouse without sleeves. The other one was taller than him, with a long fringe covering half of his face. Probably Chinese or Vietnamese from what he looked like. And finally the last boy was short and obese, having most of his hair shaved to minimum and dyed in the red color. He left something like Mohawk on his head which was loosened. He was wearing a parka and jogging pants.

Bryan looked down and saw various textbooks scatter on the floor next to the girl which was looking rather unsecure. There was also a paper bag with her lunch as he guessed.

'Whoops, I'm sorry. Looks like I accidentally knocked down your bag.', the boy with stylized hair spoke as first.

The rest of his comrades was giggling behind his back, giving the girl nasty looks.

'What a douche.', Bryan thought while narrowing his brows.

'M-Milton! Why are you doing this?', she crouched down to pick up her belongings.

That time, Milton's foot smashed right into the paper bag and rubbed against it, tearing it in several places.

'Whoopsie, now I stepped into your lunch… Hope you won't be sad.', he giggled as well this time while taking his foot from the bag, 'You're not gonna cry, are you?'

The girl didn't say anything. Biting her lower lip she brought the books to herself and slowly stood up.

'You ain't gonna say anything? Oh Molly, you're so smart during the classes, I thought you'll give us a lecture.', he continued teasing her.

'Oh Milton, take it easy. She's gonna go cry to her mommy if you continue being like this.', the tallest boy burst out laughing slightly.

'Hey, Chen, don'cha forgot she doesn't have a mom anymore?', the fatty gave him a faked serious look.

'Oh, you're right Eloy… She's dead.'

'She died because she got herself drunken to that point so she's six feet under.', Milton stared at Molly and smiled seeing her trembling.

'She still has her dad though. But he's nothing but a piece of thrash.', the Chinese boy sighed and shrugged.

'He's drinking like a pig and sleeping on the streets. If it was me, I'd wish him to be dead already.', fancy haired boy laughed aloud.

The girl was shaking, feeling like the most pathetic being in the whole world. Tears gathered in her green eyes, waiting to fall down in any time. Before she started crying she heard someone rushing next to her and the group of bullies. It was no one else than Bryan. The boy was clenching his teeth and before she took a closer look at him, he punched Milton with all his might right to his face with a hearable crack. The other boys were just standing in astonishment not knowing how to react. It was apparently the first time something like this happened. The victim clutched his face into his palm to take it out after a while just to notice blood stains on it.

'You…', he muttered.

'Say something more and I'll punch you again you stupid jerk!'

'Who the hell are you anyway? A friend of hers?'

Bryan totally ignored his demands and turned to the girl with a bit more eased expression on the face.

'You okay?'

Molly managed to make an awkward nod and wrapped her arms around the books more while looking into his icy blue eyes.

'You gonna pay for what you have done you stinkard!', Milton held his pained nose and made a really pathetic looking pose.

At the moment into the classroom walked a homeroom teacher of this group. The woman gasped when saw blood trails on the floor, oozing from the boy's hand.

'What happened here?', she managed to make a really weak squeak while running her gaze at the injured boy, the rest of the bullies and finally onto Bryan and scared Molly.

* * *

Bryan was taken before the headmaster and Milton to the school infirmary to get his nose patched somehow and to cease the bleeding. He was surprised to find out that the headmaster was no one else than Mr. Suarez. It seemed that the school was short on teachers so he was teaching algebra in a meanwhile. The man made a disgusted face upon seeing the culprit. Coughing into his fist before glancing again at him he arose from the armchair.

'Well well, _señor_ Fury. First day at school, first bad impression and first calling to the headmaster in your school career. You're doing pretty good.', the man quipped and then looked at him severely.

The boy was standing before the headmaster's desk and was gazing at the old-fashioned carpet while looking pretty concerned and angry at the same time. If he could, he'd tell him that he has no taste into interior design.

'I know that you just lost your mother and got to the orphanage but acting like this is prohibited. Did you even have a reason?'

'Milton and his friends… They bullied one girl and-', Bryan wasn't able to finish his sentence as the man grunted.

'Yes, Milton, he's our important student.', Mr. Suarez started with that and after a small pause continued, 'You see, his parents are pretty famous in Sacramento and regularly donate our small school. So if something will happen to him and they decide to transfer him, we're doomed… _A entender?_', he raised one of his bushy eyebrows at him and leaned towards.

The boy nodded feeling the more embarrassed with every second.

'So I suggest you to don't interfere with him anymore. Just ignore him and his band. You'll save us and yourself problems. Got it? Good, then go to the classroom and act like you're supposed to.', the man sat back on his comfy armchair and crossed his short arms on his torso.

'But how can you tolerate bullying other students? Molly was innocent and she got harmed by him!', Bryan closed his fists and let the anger spoke in him.

'Look kid, I think I've already told you to not mess with him. If you don't follow my words, you'll get kicked out from the school. Now, be a good _chico_ and get out from my sight.', the man leaned back on his armchair and let a small grunt escape from his mouth as he did that.

The culprit pierced him with his ice blue eyes with more feeling of cold than there usually is in them. Without a single word he left the room and marched back to the class, kicking the coke cane he spotted on the school corridor.

'Damn. This is not right. At all.', he thought to himself while sighing tiredly, 'There's no justice on this world at all…'

With that in mind entered the classroom and got consumed into the rest of usual school-day.

* * *

The day ended smoothly to Bryan's delight and he smiled to himself when hearing the ring announcing the end of classes. Happily tucked his stuff into the backpack and headed to the exit. There was no sign of Milton and the band. Not that he cared. He'd rather not see his ugly face ever again. Even though he kinda fixed his nose.

As the boy guessed, kids from the orphanage were gathering around the gate at the backyard. But then he felt an urge to go to the toilet since he didn't visit it for the whole school day. When he closed the door behind him and rushed to the nearest cabin, he heard the door opening and after that felt someone's strong grip on his shoulder. Then before he turned to the person standing before him he heard a rather serious tone.

'We gotta talk.'

* * *

'What do you mean that you didn't see Bryan?', Hikari pierced the other woman standing before her with her severe and slightly panicked sight.

'Oh uhm… I thought he's coming along and then I realized he's not around…', she looked down, nervously stroking the carpet with her heel.

The Asian looked at her once again and took one step forward.

'The headmaster called Mr. Richards an hour ago. Did you know that Bryan has broken someone's nose? What if he decided to flee from the orphanage?'

'I… I…', she stammered glancing in Hikari's black eyes a few time before turning away from the intense of her stare, 'I'm sorry!'

'We need to find him. If he doesn't get back in the next hour, we'll go after him.'

After that she left to Bryan's room in case he might come back, leaving the poor woman with miserable feeling in her stomach.

It wasn't an hour in total when Bryan pulled the handle to his door and saw his foreseer, sitting on the bed.

'My dear god-'

The woman stood up quickly and rushed to him, wanting to make sure she's not daydreaming. The boys' face was swollen on the right cheek and covered in multiple bruises and scratches. His clothes looked dirty and damaged as well. She wanted to ask him a lot of questions but due to the heavy shock she managed to whisper in a trembling voice as if she was refusing to herself to admit what is she seeing.

'What happened?'

He ignored her.

'Nothing.', he muttered.

Hikari sighed and gently placed hand on his swollen cheek giving him that motherly look in her eyes. Bryan did see that and quickly ducked wincing in pain in result.

'I said it's nothing! I wanna be alone.', the boy demented trying to intimidate her with his trademark cold stare.

'Those eyes don't work on me anymore, you know. I've already seen a lot of them…', she whispered while closing her eyes and trying to touch him once again.

This time he didn't move even a little bit. Though her touch felt somewhat familiar. Before he said anything she moved her hand back and tried smiling at him.

'Wait here, I'll get some bandages.', she ordered and quickly left the room leaving Bryan confused.

For the first time since he has left his home, he felt something like this. The soothing hand. He lost himself in his thoughts because of that single touch. When he snapped out of it he was sitting on the bed, gazing at the ceiling for no particular reason.

Hikari in that time rushed into infirmary to take first aid and when she was about to get back, she saw Molly before her. The girl was looking at her sneakers and played with her own fingers a little bit before finally speaking.

'Miss Grasland…?'

'Yes? Something's wrong?', she examined her just in case she'd need the same treatment as Bryan.

Gladly she wouldn't.

'Today at school… He protected me. The boy who broke someone's nose.'

The woman stood in astonishment and blinked several times unnaturally. Obviously not putting together the two facts.

'But I heard from headmaster that Bryan attacked a student here for no reason.', she said while furrowing a little bit.

'Milton and his friends were bullying me again. Since Mandy is sick they used the opportunity to make fun of me.', the girl looked down, biting her lower lip and clutching her fists.

'So Bryan…', Hikari started slowly.

'Yes, he protected me before they could do something to me. Although I don't like the idea of violence, I really appreciate that he hit Milton that time.'

The woman scratched her own head while analyzing the both facts she just heard.

'It was Milton too who stepped and broke my glasses a few weeks before the summer break. I didn't fall on my own.', she continued trying to pick up eye contact with Hikari.

The overseer sighed heavily, scratching the head more intensively than before.

'Geez, seriously? So Milton is that kind of person?

'Yes ma'am. He's bullying all the orphans at class for no reason. He has a grudge against us that I don't understand. But because his parents are rich and donate the school, teachers let him go away with the murder. He said that himself once when bragging about them…', at the thought of having a complete and loving family the girl looked down, admitting to herself that she envies him.

Hikari smilled a little bit and gently stroked girl's ginger hair.

'I'm glad you told me that. I owe you one. Wouldn't you mind if I took you for a candy floss someday?'

Molly's face beamed with happiness in a second like if someone has casted a happy-make spell on her.

'Thank you miss Grasland!'

The woman waved at her while leaving to finally take care of Bryan. She felt relieved as she pushed the handle of the door to his room to see he hasn't locked himself as before. Not wasting any second she sat next to him and opened a tube of some soothing ointment for scratches and bruises and took some of it on her forefinger. Then gently rubbed it into the boy's injuries on cheeks and then into his forehead. He was almost staring at her not believing that she's paying attention to him and his needs. For this moment, his icy blue eyes become a little bit more warmer and his facial features got more softer and relaxed. The woman was concentrating into patching him up as precise as she could get and as least painful. She seemed busy while doing so but she wasn't mad because she has to take care of him. There was no regret into her heart.

'Can you roll up the hoodie a bit?', she asked while taking more of the ointment at her fingers.

Not saying anything he did as she asked, still gazing with curiosity at her calm yet concentrated face. Then he felt the touch of her long fingers and later warm palms on his stomach. This particular act made his head exploded with memories of his deceased mother. He didn't remember much his early childhood, but the moment when Sarah was rubbing his pained belly after he god kicked by that rapist was exactly like this one. Seeing his mom's face when looking at Hikari, his eyes welled up with small tears. When she moved into putting plasters on his face she noticed the tears.

'Did I press a bit too much somewhere?', she asked with hearable concern in her voice.

The boy blinked in surprise and felt how one tear has escaped from his eyelid and slid on his cheek. He almost on instant started to rub off the wetness on his face while shaking the head. After sniffing like if he had cold and making his eyes look red from rubbing he decided to look at her.

'Then why?', Hikari placed a few plasters on his cheeks, making sure she didn't miss anything.

Bryan didn't answer her. Sure, she seemed nicer than he had thought but still she was just a stranger to him. Plus he didn't want to think about his mother every time and to have her very few last moments before his eyes ever again.

He just wanted to move on and continue his miserable life. The woman gently placed hand on his black hair and stroked him in a soothing way.

'Do you wanna get stronger?'

The boy looked at her again with a puzzled look.

'Huh? Why would I?'

'To never see someone in pain again. And to never get beaten so bad as well.', she smiled teasingly at the end, poking his patched nose.

Bryan stared at her widely once again. Slowly the shell around him started to break. His heart raced insanely from excitement. He felt it's his chance now.

'How?', he asked while making a gulping sound.

When the woman answered he felt some kind of a mysterious power around her that he couldn't understand or explain in words. She leaned forward to him a bit and let the head rest on her arm while closing eyes to express more her smile.

'I'll teach you kickboxing, how about that?'

-the tapes focuses on her face and slowly get's blank-


	3. Chapter 3, The scent of dandelions

**Chapter 3, 'The scent of dandelions'**

-tape is shattering until it zooms at orphanage's dining room-

Bryan was sitting in the room before long table alongside other kids around his age. Some of them were yawning, some were laughing and some were chatting about dreams they had the recent night. Usual stuff according to the young boy. He wasn't a part of them. He just sat there and was lost in his thoughts.

'Do you wanna get stronger?'

Hikari's voice rung in his head. Then he saw her gentle yet confident smiling face. Her offer of making him stronger by teaching him kickboxing couldn't let go from his head.

'Stronger, huh..? Will I be able to protect the ones I care about?', he whispered to himself being sure nobody would pay attention to him anyway.

Then he let his eye lids get down a bit more while looking at his opened palm. Sighing he finally closed his eyes, being ready to eat the breakfast. Before he managed to grab the teapot to get something warm to drink, someone placed hands on his eyes so he couldn't see a single thing. That caught Bryan completely off guard.

'Wha-?', the boy tried to break free from someone's hands but again it was too late.

The hands escaped from his eyes so in the end and his ones met the air. When he looked behind him he noticed a girl with freckles and long ginger hair. Bryan could tell that her eyes were laughing aloud though her lips were sealed in a long smile.

'Yahoo, mister nosebreaker.', she grinned even more and moved one of her hands to wave at him.

'Eh-? Molly-?', he blinked a bit not being sure what's going on.

Molly was always shy and wouldn't do something like this. That's what Bryan thought. The girl glomped on him and squeezed a lot.

'Thanks for savin' my sister, I owe you one!', she announced while hugging him.

Now that made Bryan even more confused. A girl hugged him? What's more – she basically lunged at him to do so. And who's the sister she speaks of?

'S-Sister?', Bryan stammered while trying to get over the whole situation.

When he peeked behind her he noticed the Molly he met before. She has her hair combed into two small ponytails at the bottom of her head with some loose hair band on the sides of her face. With glasses resting on her nose, there was no mistake. She's the real Molly.

'Mandy, I told you not to play any stupid games, you probably confused him.', she stated while walking to them.

'He doesn't mind that, right Bry-Bry?', the other girl looked at him sweetly while letting him go.

'Whatever.', he started to rub his pained from sudden hug neck, 'So you two are… twins?'

'Bingo!', Mandy snapped fingers at Bryan's deduction in approval.

'So here's my older sister Mandy and my name is Molly. We're Adams twins.', the younger sibling slightly bowed in politeness.

'The name's Bryan. Bryan Fury. Written with y.', the boy scratched his head.

'Woah, so cool! I've never heard of such last name before!', the older sibling almost jumped from excitement and clapped her hands.

Molly just sighed quietly and patted her sister's shoulder.

'We should take a sit at our table now. They're serving fudge.', she begged.

'They are-? Fine, let's go then. See you around Bryan.', the older girl grinned once again and waved at the boy 'good bye' gesture.

'Yeah, uhm, bye.', Bryan murmured still being slightly confused at the whole fuss.

'What a weird girl-', the thought, 'That Mandy.'

Then he decided to finally start eating his breakfast. Even getting beaten at school the other day didn't prevent him from going to school today. But as soon as he finishes the day, here will come a weekend so he could finally practice kickboxing with Hikari. Slightly nodding to himself he let himself enjoy the meal.

* * *

His school day passed really fast despite counting off hours and then minutes to the end of every classes. He didn't remember the last time he was that excited before. Even last Christmas wasn't as fascinating as kickboxing lesson. His happy training scenario obviously has left a wide smile on his face since he entered the school. And it was too unusual for Mr. Suarez to see a kid being happy at classes without any known for him reason.

'What's so _gracioso_ this time, _chico? Mi Dio,_ don't say you're planning to do another awkward thing like breaking someone's nose!', the man grunted while looking slightly scared at the smiling boy.

He was dying to tell him that he was beaten way more by Milton's friends but he bit the tongue before letting go some of the bitter words.

'Who knows…', though Bryan decided to torment the teacher a tiny bit.

He didn't notice the sweat on Mr. Suarez's forehead as it slid down to his bushy eyebrows. Nervously rubbing it off, the man gestured hands about, getting red all over his face.

'_Tu diablo!_Do you want me to get a heart attack? Don't you dare do that!'

'Yes yes…'

Bryan perfectly avoided upcoming chalk flying right at him. After that he only heard some Spanish blabbering that his teacher spoke to himself to calm down. Though the boy could have swore he heard some profanities addressed at him. Molly sighed quietly to herself while shrugging. Mandy smiled widely at the boy and showed him a thumb-up when he peeked at her. Other kids were sharing looks and whispers at the same time. Without a doubt, Bryan was an infamous star to the most of them. None orphan had picked bone with Milton by breaking his nose. Though they knew that bruises and plasters on the boy's face had something to do with him. They wondered if it'll end only at this one time or Bryan will also get bullied.

The class went smoothly after that and at the sound of the school ring, Bryan nearly jumped from his sit just to clutter his notepad and pencil case into the rucksack.

'Fury! Sit down, the class is not over yet!', Mr. Suarez thundered all over the room so even the rest of kids caught their sits or desks because of the impact.

The boy sat down politely never letting go of eye contact with the man.

'Before you'll leave, I'll announce a _pequeño_ homework.'

The kids let go of a hearable groan. They had better idea for spending their weekend rather than just sitting over textbooks solving stupid formulas.

'You need to solve every exercise from the page 38 and be prepared for a small _examen_ after weekend. Now you can dismiss. I hope you'll all have a _bueno_ weekend.', after that Mr Suarez coughed to his fist and began to wipe off the blackboard.

'Holy crap, it's 10 exercises with many sub tasks in total!', one kid whined aloud.

'Just great.', Bryan thought to himself and clutched his belonging to the rucksack with a pure disgust written on his face.

He heard other kids complaining as well because of the massive homework they were given. He wanted to practice kickboxing for the rest of the week and now he'll also have to pay attention to something else. Because he wasn't paying attention to the past class he barely understood most of things the teacher spoke about. Which made it obvious he'll have to sit before the textbook way longer than in any other case. Sighing to himself and while tightening the eyelids he pushed chair towards his desk right after he stood up. To add it up, he was also nudged by Chen and Eloy before he managed to get out from the class. They were grinning and chuckling like idiots. Well, like annoying idiots. Bryan winced a bit because they hit one of his bruises on his left arm. Speaking of bruises, those hurt like hell. It seemed that he wasn't their first prey because they knew exactly where to kick to make it hurt the most. He didn't say a word. The faster he'll leave the school building the better.

He lined up with other kids from the orphanage at the yard and then marched geese style right after their guardian. It was a woman in her early 30thies with short brown hair. She seemed like a person that you can't depend on. From time to time she stopped from leading kids just to see if no one's missing again. Occasionally glancing at Bryan as well. Last time she forgot to check if he was in the group or not. Just to spare another awkward moment of being scolded by Hikari, she decided to be super-cautious just in case.

The boy glared at her wanting the woman stop peeking at him like this. Luckily his cold stare was enough to knock her guard off. She immediately turned her head away and silently lead the kids.

'Finally.', Bryan thought and smiled to himself.

It was really getting in his nerves. Then he felt someone patting his shoulder. When he turned around he noticed grinned Mandy and then Molly who just caught up with her older sister.

'_Hola!__Estás bien?'_

'Oh jeez Mandy. Spare me this torture.'

She giggled while her sister slightly sighed and tilted the head down.

'Sorry Bryney.', the girl waved hand about and looked at him, 'Saaay…'

She prolonged the word on purpose.

'Yeah?'

'You wanna get some help with the math, right?'

Bryan turned his head at her again, being slightly surprised.

'How did you-'

'No biggie, I just saw you looking quite down when Mr. Suarez announced the homework. So I was thinking that you might need some help.', Mandy smiles widely once again, making freckles on her cheeks more visible .

'You're right but are you really that good at math? You seemed to be daydreaming at his class today.', the boy raised one of his eyebrows in surprise.

'Me? Nope, but my sis is.', she cheerfully squeezed Molly's hand and dragged her before them.

The poor girl moaned as Mandy did that and then moved her glasses back into fitting position on her nose.

'Yeah, I'm not an ace but I've never failed any exam before in my life.'

'Word! She's like a computer! You can totally count on her!', the older twin embraced the other girl and rested head on her shoulder.

Bryan moved his sight at the twins and examined Molly's face. She was blushing though he couldn't tell whether she was doing it because she was embarrassed or happy.

'Is that okay with you?', he asked.

'Sure, I wanted to pay you back for helping me with Milton yesterday so it's okay.', she smiled calmly.

'See? Everything's_bueno_, no need to be worried.', the older sibling replied.

'Fine, but if you dare do use any more Spanish I'll smack you!'

* * *

It was over dinner time in the orphanage. Some of the kids were eating sweets they were given when the main dish was served and some were saving them for later. Because it was Friday night they could stay one hour longer and play as much as they like. That's why most of the boys in various ages were playing soccer at the yard and girls were playing with a huge collection of dolls, stuffed animals and such in the playing room.

Every half of a year the orphanage was donated with new toys and books to play with. Also about every 3-4 months the kids there also were provided with new or 2nd hand clothes. When the day as coming, the children were given an inquiry which asked them what clothes they were needing so every kid got the right piece of the wardrobe. Bryan could tell the time for that was close because he heard shreds of words like 'clothes', 'soon', 'new', 'that paper'. He tried his best not to think too much about his current situation and his future. Especially if it was tied with the orphanage. He barely got over his mother's death and something new like filling the paper to get right clothing pieces was something really new to him. Usually it was his mom who picked up some clothes for him or his neighbors that were kind enough to hand over some that were slightly used by them.

The boy stood up from his chair and decided to move somewhere else to free his mind of this thoughts. Then he remembered that he should find Hikari. Slightly smiling he ran through the orphanage dark hall in order to get at the higher level. Then when he was upstairs he realized that he have no idea where she might me. He was cold to her for all the time so he didn't even get a chance to let her say where's her room or where she can be found. He was about to heavily smack his forehead with his opened hand but then he noticed a black woman who appeared to be a maid here. She seemed to be in her late 40thies. Also she wasn't slim. Not wasting any time he walked to her hoping she won't ignore him.

'Excuse me miss-'

'Yes?', the woman turned her head at him and smiled.

Bryan sighed out a sign of relief in his thoughts and smiled back politely at her.

'Do you know where I can find miss Hikari? I wanted to ask her something', he asked.

The woman furrowed for a second and then eased her expression.

'I think I saw her downstairs using an orphanage's payphone. But hey I haven't seen you before, you're new here, kid?'

The boy slightly nodded.

'I see, so you probably don't know where's the payphone, right? Getcha downstairs and turn right and then left. It's around headmaster's office. You'll know it's his door once you get there so ain't you worry sweetie.', then she gently patted his head.

'Uhuh, thank you miss uh…', then he kinda scratched his head upon realizing he doesn't know her name either.

'Call me Berta, Berta Burns. Everybody here calls me just by name, no need for formalities.', she chuckled.

'Okay then, thanks Berta, see you later.', the boy bowed his head as a sign of gratitude and ran down.

'Hey what's your name?', she shouted to make sure he'll hear her.

'Bryan, thanks again!', he shouted back nearly tripping at some point.

The woman sighed and shook her head while getting back on her duty.

Just like Berta said, he was managed to find Hikari using the payphone. It might seem funny but he wasn't surprised that she's still talking on the phone. What made him cautious and curious was what she said.

'I'll see if I can come over there before this month. … No, no… I can't spend Christmas with you, I have a work to do here. I'm sorry-'

His mind raced.

'She has someone with who she can spend Christmas?'

Then the woman glanced at him, noticing his presence. The boy gulped and swiftly hid behind the corner.

'Hey I gotta finish now, I'll call you sometime later, okay? Bye.'

Bryan wondered why is he actually hiding. It's ridiculous. When he was about to peek behind the corner he gasped as he saw Hikari standing right before him. At first her expression seemed serious as she had a stern looking face but then it slowly turned into a wide grin.

'Don't you know that eavesdropping is rude?', she pressed a fist against his head and rubbed a tiny bit making sure he'd feel it but it wouldn't cause him too much pain.

The boy yelped upon the tease and moved out of her range, still facing her directly.

'I wasn't ! I was looking for you and then I spotted you talking on the phone so I didn't wanna interfere.', glaring he started rubbing the pained spot on his head to cease the stinking.

'Is that so?', she made a surprised expression.

'Yeah, why I would wanna eavesdrop you?', he blinked a few times and stopped moving his hand.

'Beats me.', she shrugged but then asked, 'Why you were looking for me?'

'You promised me that you'll teach me kickboxing.'

'Oh sure, so you what… You wanna start today?'

'I can't waste time on doing nothing, I must get stronger!', Bryan took one step forward and closed his hands into fists.

Hikari looked at him for a bit and couldn't help but to smile slightly in spite of herself.

'I see.', she closed her eyes and put hands on her hips.

'So?'

'So do you have any homework to do?', she gave him one of the stares that told him there's no use of lying to her about that.

He sighed and paused for a bit, turning his gaze away.

'Yeah… Math. We're having a test soon.', he answered still not looking back at her.

'Mr. Suarez is your math teacher, right?'

He nodded.

'Then you've gotta do your best at your homework and later at the test. We won't start until you're done at least with studying.'

Bryan immediately turned his head in her direction.

'But I have the whole weekend for that! Please let me train with you today-'

'If you manage to finish your homework today we will. But not sooner.', she cut him at the end while passing by him.

The boy looked down and bit his lower lip.

'You just wait.', he whispered and ran away.

She only managed to look at the direction where he left and sighed once again and then shook head.

* * *

'Molly please, can you help me with homework? I need to finish it today at any costs!'

Bryan managed to find the twins in the study room where the younger girl was the only studying person at the time. Mandy was literally just hanging on the char, slightly swinging besides her sister .

'Well okay, I was about to start doing it myself anyway.', she blinked a bit and adjusted glasses on her nose.

The boy smiled and nodded happily.

'So I'll bring here my notepad and by that time you'll get prepared, okay?'

'Deal.', the girl smiled back and closed the book she was reading.

Not wasting any time Bryan rushed to his room for the studying supplies. Mandy stopped swinging on the chair and looked at her sister.

'Seems like our infamous hero has something up in his mind again.'

'I hope it's nothing bad though.', the other girl opened the textbook and looked for the exercises.

'This gonna be fun.', she grinned and decided to see what happens now.

Just when the boy got back to the studying room, Molly had prepared everything they might need. What's more, she started solving one problem with an ease. Bryan only sit next to her peeking at the notepad where she was writing. He was really impressed with the speed of solving them. Of course she was taking small breaks from them just to make the boy understand the whole analyzing and such. She was really patient and didn't seem to mind repeating some things all over again just to help Bryan.

'Do you understand now?', she glanced at him.

He was busy re-writing everything to his own notepad, occasionally peeking at the girls. The intense of her stare made him pause just to look back. Making a dumb expression he slightly nodded.

Molly couldn't help but to sigh and smack palm against her forehead. Mandy giggled at their action.

'Hey quit giggling, you're actually doing nothing useful here.', Bryan sent her a killing cold stare.

'I don't have to, it was you who asked for help, not me.', she leaned backward on the chair so she was able to see the setting sun behind the window.

'Still I don't see a reason why would you just sit here not doing anything. You also gotta pass this test, right?'

She didn't say anything.

'Bryan, it's okay, just concentrate on the task. You wanna finish it today, right?', Molly gently pulled his sleeve.

'Yeah right.', he looked once again at Mandy's face before forcing himself to switch into studying mode.

The contour of her face was gently defined by the warm light beaming right on her side-face. Her ginger hair seemed to be burning this way and nearly blending with the light itself. Before he moved his eyes from her, he noticed the sad expression on her face.

It was so unlike her.

-tape shatters and goes blank after zooming at Mandy's face-


	4. Chapter 4, The scent of heathers

This chapter was proofread with the help of **UnKnownDrive** who won't be helping me anymore so I'll have to rely on myself again. I hope that it won't put you off as I'll do everything to improve.

* * *

**Chapter 4, 'The scent of heathers'**

-tape is set again with pictures that slowly zoom in on the windows from the orphanage's dining room, then shatters and pauses on a scene where kids are eating supper-

-the tape aims at Bryan's face-

Supper was being served at the orphanage so all the kids were eating up. The staff working there like Hikari or Berta were also helping themselves. Mr. Richards usually never eats with them because he leaves at home to enjoy the meal together with his family. The only adults present at the night besides the kids were two security guards and Hikari. The rest only stay up until 10 PM at most and leaves for their homes afterward. Thankfully they have never encountered a burglar or any other sort of a criminal who might want to break in there.

The half Asian stretched out her muscles a bit as she sat before the dining table. Right after when she started consuming her food she heard steps behind her. When she turned to look at the person, she realized it was Bryan. She blinked a bit with half of a French bun in her mouth. It could've been one of the so-called "Kodak moments".

The boy proudly pulled out of his hand a notepad before the woman.

'Check it out.'

Hikari with puzzled look eyed him for a while, not being sure what he means.

'The math I had to work at.', the boy handed the notepad over.

Some pages contained neatly written formulas and such with solved problems. He was almost grinning like a small kid which wanted its parent to buy some sweets for them.

The woman swallowed the rest of the bun and quickly drank down a glass of water. After that she peeked at the pages and read the content quickly.

'My my…', she scoffed.

Bryan furrowed at her reaction.

'Something wrong with it?'

'No, not at all in fact. I just don't believe you actually finished the homework by today.', she gently smiled and gave him back the notepad.

The boy grinned widely, 'I told ya.'

'So I guess I can let you practice kickboxing with me.'

'After supper, right?', Bryan's eyes tried to catch the dark-marbled eyes that belonged to his overseer.

'Today?', she made a surprised expression while chewing some ham from the plate.

'That's why I finished the homework so fast. Today we can stay one hour longer, so why don't we do that?', he begged her with his gaze.

Hikari felt deep inside that since she promised him she couldn't just turn him down. He impressed her with his seriousness about the whole training and overall determination. Plus it was one of those rare times when she saw him smiling.

'I guess I can't be helped. Just let me finish the meal, okay?'

Bryan nodded.

'I don't need to worry about you eating supper because it looks like you've already had it-', she giggled. 'You have food on your face'

The boy's eyes widened almost in horror and his face reddened in embarrassment.

'You're a little piggy you know?', she stood up and gently wiped the crumbs off of his face with a doily.

'I could've done that myself.', he made a grimace.

'Did I hurt your man's pride doing this? Sorry then.', she mocked him a bit and sat down.

He looked away, the red colour never leaving his face. Why he had the crumbs on his face was because he wanted to hurry up with eating so he can catch Hikari.

'Alright. You can go to your room now and wait for me, I'll pick you up for sure.', she smiled and turned her head to see the plate better when eating.

'Okay!'

He forgot why he was mad in the first place and did as she said so.

* * *

She kept her promise and not too long after that she knocked at his door and asked him to come with him. Man, he was so excited. He was also wondering "Where does she live?". They walked through a darkening corridor right to the very end of it. Then the woman opened the lone door that was on the left of the end. Then before their eyes appeared staircases which probably lead to the attic.

The boy noticed the sudden change of the environment. The walls were looking really old and they were stinking full of humidity and mildew. It wouldn't surprise him if he found a fungus growing somewhere here. Then they stopped before another door. It was looking way older than the ones he has already seen in the orphanage.

He looked down and spotted spiders crawling around. Man, he HATED them. Not because they looked intimidating but because the way they walked drove him insane. He raised his foot ready to stomp them till they stop moving. The poor beings didn't know that Hikari saved their life as she asked the boy to come in. Bryan eyed them for a while before eventually coming to her room.

'Damn.'

This was the first thought that ran through his head.

The room was quite big, square planned. The furniture was old fashioned and painted a white colour that was put on them more than once. Also, the wallpaper looked old. But mostly what caught his eye was a punching bag hanging from the ceiling and some trophies and kickboxing flyers on one side of the room. They were making him even more excited.

'I'm sorry if the room might look messy to you. I don't spend much of a time here aside from training and sleeping.', she glanced at him for a second and smiled as she did that.

Then she walked right to her 'training spot' to pick up the gloves and to put them on her hands before starting. Bryan in the meanwhile noticed a photo frame lying on the commode. The picture was faced down for some reason so he couldn't see what was on it.

'Could that be a picture of that mysterious person she talked to earlier?', he wondered as he studied the surface of the frame itself.

'I know that this wallpaper is horrible but I got the room that way.'

The boy snapped out from his thoughts and looked at her and then at the walls.

'Oh right… It feels like more like if it was some granny's room. Maybe a hardcore one because of the kickboxing nuances.'

'Why thank you.', she replied sharply. 'If I want to I can fix that lavender wallpaper and get new furniture but as I said before, I don't spend a lot of time here so they don't bother me. Also I'm rather picky about wasting money.', she checked if the gloves fit properly and won't slip out when striking.

'They pay you for looking after us, right?'

'Yeah. Thankfully I don't have to pay for living here. I got this room after the previous lady who worked here also as a guardian.', Hikari turned at him, lightly smiling and then stood on her toes to get the cardboard box from the top of a wardrobe.

When she opened it, she found another pair of the gloves that bore the signs of being used in the past.

'Catch.', she threw them at him.

When the boy caught them he looked closely at them. They were red and glossy with some jagged pieces but nothing too major.

'I've been using them when I was around your age. They should fit your hands.', she swiftly explained.

The boy quickly put them where they were supposed to be and closed his fists and made some quick jabs just to check if they fit well.

'Seems like they do. So tell me what do you know about kickboxing anyway.', the woman started doing a little stretching exercise.

'That it's… some kind of martial arts? Where your main objective is to use both kicks and… do some boxing?', the boy stammered not being too sure of what he's saying.

Hikari gave him one of those amused looks and shook her head in disbelief.

'So you know nothing of it, but I think you're not interested into knowing facts like who invented the style or the origins… Well maybe the matter that it originated from Japan should do for now. Also I'll teach you a standard type of kickboxing you can see on some official US events. It's labeled as full-contact karate but I prefer using the shorter term.'

Bryan blinked rapidly upon hearing the info and scratched his head right after.

'So naive...', she said quietly to herself and later glanced over the boy and now spoke at her full voice, 'Just watch the presentation.'

The boy nodded and his eyes widened and sparkled with admiration as Hikari performed a very strong, quick and precise punch right into the training bag. In the next second she delivered the second strike and repeated them. She only changed her position and style of punches. Some of them were high and some straight. To just add up she decided to include kicks after she made the bag swing back and forth.

They were as precise as the punches. Bryan noticed how her expression has changed. She looked focused and her eyes gave out a sharp impression.

She was really fast and he could tell that the bag wasn't light at all. She attacked like a well-oiled machine, changing legs and fists every few strikes.

When he got almost used to the pattern she performed a roundhouse kick and soon afterwards in a blink of eye she struck with her right elbow.

The boy shivered as he heard the impact of strongly smacked leather. He imagined what kind of pain it'd be if she hit the solar plexus. That would result into an almost sudden black out.

Then she put the bag back in place and turned at Bryan who was staring at her in adoration.

'How did you like tha-'

'THAT WAS AWESOME!'

He grinned widely in pure excitement.

Hikari wiped off the sweat from her forehead with a sleeve and then patted Bryan on his head.

'These were only some basic jabs and kicks but I'm glad you liked them.', she smiled warmly and stepped beside him 'Are you sure you want to practice this fighting style?'

'Sure thing!', he nodded getting into a fighting stance of some sorts.

After seeing this she chuckled and got into a basic stance commonly used in kickboxing practices or tournaments.

'If you wanna start properly then look at me and copy the stance.', she ordered.

The boy moved his left fist forward from him and bent in toward his elbow while doing the same with his other one. Then he made a small stride and angled his knees so he wasn't standing on straight legs.

'Is that how you do it?', he asked while taking a glance at her.

'Yep, make sure you'll be balancing well on your legs and moving the weight of your body equally. Otherwise you won't keep the pace with kicks and punches.', she looked back at him and presented a simple jab.

Bryan nodded and copied her move.

'Good, now perform a simple jab two time and then strike a cross punch with your left fist.', she said without looking at him and did as she said so he could copy her again.

The boy did as she asked albeit his efforts looked clumsy at this point.

'Don't be slippery, put more confidence into it and try doing it faster.', she ordered.

He started looking nervous after those words. He was already trying to do his best but he knew it would be out of place to complain about that.

With every try Hikari raised her voice at him to motivate him more.

'Now look at my leg movement.'

After that she showed him a front kick then a side kick and performed a special semi-circular kick. She was still keeping her stance and her knees angled.

Bryan looked at her feeling jealous of her abilities.

'Did you catch up? Now try doing these by yourself.'

But right when he tried to perform the kicks he got lectured by her.

'Remember the leg movement.'

'No, put more feeling into it.'

'Keep your knees angled and keep the balance.'

The boy was getting less and less patient with every missed kick and after doing something without approval from Hikari.

The woman sighed knowing that it'll probably take some time until Bryan will catch up with basic commands and overall fighting style.

'Bryan, you gotta remember that kickboxing isn't just a style where you kick or punch blindly. It's more complicated than you think it could be.', she said that in a softer way so he wouldn't get too irritated.

He has started to pant noticeably. Then he moved his eyes at her and clenched the fists once again.

'I'm doing as you say but it's not that easy.', he murmured.

'Nobody said it would be easy Bryan. Maybe we call it a day now?'

'I wanna learn something new while we still have some time!', he demanded getting into fighting stance once again.

The woman merely shook her head in disbelief.

'You sure you want this? You doesn't seem ready for new moves.'

'I do, just lemme get used into it.', he glared at her with his trademark cold stare.

Hikari nodded and took a deep breath.

'So as you may know, attacking isn't the only thing you do in kickboxing. You need to learn how to duck and dodge the punches and kicks, and you also need to know how to counter-hit your opponent.', she stated.

The boy nodded rather eagerly to not show any signs of feeling tired. He also never got his eyes off from her.

'Try attacking me.'

'Huh-?'

'You heard right. You'll see how to block attacks.', she said while getting back into fighting stance.

Bryan looked unsure for a moment but then went along with her plan and delivered his first punch at her. It didn't turn out well because Hikari blocked it with ease. Rising one of her eyebrows she let him know that it had no effect on her.

Furrowing he focused once again at the task and tried out another punch wanting her to believe he forgot about kicks so he could surprise her. But not even that worked on her. With every attack he made she defended herself rather skillfully increasing the boy's frustration.

With each missed opportunity he got more and more flustered making his intentions even more obvious to her.

Finding the moment fitting to turn the table she caught one of his kicks and keep his leg in air.

'Wha-?'

'Time to switch the roles.', she announced while letting go of him, 'Your turn of defending.'

Bryan barely got in time to shield himself from one of her piercing punches, though he could tell she wasn't using her whole strength at this early stage. Nonetheless, her attacks were still quite effective. Her mix-up of strikes made her really hard to predict, so it was only a matter of time until he wouldn't be able to cope with her.

Then it happened. Her hook kick broke Bryan's defence and opened him to her straight punch which hit his face and sent him right on the floor with a loud smack.

With that she wiped off her gloves on her pants while giving him a triumphant smile while towering over him. The boy was lying flat on his back with his arms spread open and him catching for more air to cease the pain. His left cheek was getting red from the punch and it was the only place on his face where he wasn't punched before by Milton's gang.

'So this is it?', she asked while looking at him as if she were mocking him once again, 'I thought you'd last a bit longer than that.'

'...ut up.', he murmured while getting himself into sitting position, wincing.

'I'll pretend I didn't hear that, Bryan.'

'I'm so powerless against you! All of my attacks were useless and so pathetic! I- I-'

Anger has slowly taken over him making him say bitter words under his breath.

'I... I'm so hopele-'

'Stop it right there.'

Bryan raised his eyes at her in confusion as if looking at her could give him some clues.

'Saying such things won't help you, y'know. You're only making it worse for yourself.', she lectured him but it sounded more like if she was comforting him.

His cold eyes yielded to her intense dark ones which burnt with ambition. Looking down he quietly admitted she was right.

He expected another lecture or some another way of talking which will motivate him to don't give up or anything along those lines, but instead Hikari did something what he hadn't thought of. She slowly crouched to him and placed her hand on his hair, stroking it. She didn't even immediately take the hand off of his head, but instead she kept it for some time as if she was 'sending' him some positive vibe.

'You're doing fine for the first lesson. Trust me, you have some guts to ask for more while most of the pupils would want to stop right now. Just put more faith in yourself. I've already done that. I wouldn't ask you if you were interested into getting stronger without believing into you.'

Bryan's shell broke a bit again, allowing to show his true self. It was the first time for him since he came to the orphanage when someone said they believe in him. Staring at her, he let his eyes show that he was truly moved by her words, even though someone could say they were cliché.

'Get up.'

Hikari moved the hand from his head and presented it before him as she stood up encouraging him to take it.

The boy nodded and with her help he managed to stand back on his feet.

'So I guess it's about the time we train in some dodging, eh?', she asked while smiling.

Rubbing his nose with the glove, Bryan looked into her eyes and nodded quickly once again.

'Gotcha!'

From now on there was no traces of disbelief left on his face. A newfound spark of determination lights up in his eyes. Even his overseer decided to tone down the rest of the training session, shifting into another method of teaching the boy.

-the tape shows Bryan and Hikari practicing dodging, with Hikari showing him how it's done and at the same time it gradually fades out-


	5. Chapter 5, The scent of marigolds

Hiya readers, the long waited 5th chapter of the story is here! The 2nd longest chapter after the Chapter 2.

Sad thing is that I have no longer a proofreader because of some personal matters. The chapter is still half proofread and free of the mistakes but I hope this time I didn't mess it up like in the chapters before. Anyway, please enjoy and leave a review after that~!

* * *

**Chapter 5, 'The scent of marigolds'**

-tape zooms at the attic where Hikari was currently training-

-the image fades into the scene as she punches the training bag. With it swinging, the action starts-

The woman struck the bag once again with equal strength as the last hit. Without making any pauses, she began using her legs to deliver more powerful attacks.

This time her whole training was different from her usual Sunday afternoon session. What was different was the fact she has a small audience of one person watching her train. It was none other than Bryan himself who was sitting on her bed. His eyes were carefully tracking her movements, analyzing techniques and trying to name all of the punches and kicks his master told him about.

Even being here only to keep her company satisfied him. Since he came to this orphanage Hikari was the only person who took care of him despite his general coldness to anyone he met lately.

The half Asian successfully hit the bag with her high kick and then finished the combo with a backhand. After that she got back into her normal stance to turn at the boy.

'You were so awesome!', Bryan almost jumped off the bed from excitement.

'It was my usual training, nothing special about that.', she shrugged and couldn't help but smile at him.

'But I was still impressed nonetheless.', he returned the smile.

Hikari sighed and grabbed the towel she had prepared before and laid on the chair. Swinging it on her shoulders she sat next to him while rubbing off the sweat from her face with the towel end.

'Man, I really should go and get shower, I'm all sweaty...', she made a disgusted expression after that.

'Hey how about we do some training together-?', he suggested trying to look into her eyes.

Hikari stopped for a while.

'What? No way, forget about that.', she continued rubbing her face afterwards.

'But why not-?'

'Because we made a deal, I'm only giving you one training session until you have your math test and I'm not showing you anything new if you end up getting a bad note.', she said without looking at him.

Bryan looked down, hurt from what she said.

'You're being harsh-'

'I'm not listening to you', she turned her head away from him teasingly.

'Hikariiiiiiiiii...', he begged while shaking her arm.

'Be a good boy and surprise me with your exam result first so maybe you can expect something special.', she winked at him as she looked back again into his direction.

She knew it'd motivate him to work hard. Thing is, he was still much of a kid deep inside. Sighing she gently stroked his hair while giving him one of 'motherly looks'.

Bryan looked at her for a while and then escaped her sight feeling both embarrassed and happy.

'Uhuh...', he nodded right after that.

'So go to your room and study some more. Don't forget to brush your teeth and take a shower as well later on.', she instructed him as she raised her hand off his hair.

Bryan rolled his eyes and jumped off her bed and headed to the exit.

'I know that', he scoffed trying to show he doesn't care what she says.

'And remember to wash your navel as well', she continued teasing him this time.

'I'm not a kid anymore! Don't tell me that!', he glared back at her and opened the door.

'Yeah right_..._', she thought and giggled to herself a little.

'Goodnight-', Hikari slightly waved at him before he closed the door.

'Night-'

Bryan finally left her room and then she heard his steady stomps on the stairs. With that she was ready to get back into her business. Smiling she stood up from the bed to put the towel back on the chair. After that her eyes wandered involuntarily to the lying photo frame on the commode. Then she felt a sign of guilt building up inside of her heart so she swiftly turned her sight away to focus on something else.

* * *

'… and now you can start writing. Remember no cheating because if I see you doing so, you can be sure that you'll retake this exam with new problems. _Buena __suerte __mis __niños_', with that Mr. Suarez announced the start of the test.

All kids rushed to flip the paper sheets over to reveal the problems. Some of them already have begun filling in answers or doing calculations.

Bryan briefly got through the text and he made a sad expression afterwards. This wasn't going to end up as smoothly as he wanted to. Tapping his temple with the tip of the pencil he tried to think of the answers for the test. He wasn't even sure if he was picking the correct answers and if his calculations are even correct.

Not able to concentrate on working anymore he glanced at the Adams twins to check how they are doing. Molly as always had her sharp and collected expression while scribing down the numbers. She paused only to lift back the glasses from the nose with her finger.

'She sure is like a computer', the boy thought with a sign of amazement on his face.

Then his eyes picked up Mandy sitting before the sheet of paper and actually doing nothing.

'What is she doing? She's gonna fail this exam', another thought ran through his head.

'Fury! Mind your own test or I'll void it for you!'

Mr. Suarez most likely noticed Bryan's interest into the girls paper sheet . The boy snapped away almost like if he has burnt himself with boiling water.

After that when he tried to concentrate on his own business but was disturbed by a wet and sticky ball of chewed paper that was shot directly on his black hair. He didn't even need to know who has done that as he already has answer for it in his mind. The chuckling sound from behind his back was enough of proof.

'Screw you Milton', murmuring to himself he furrowed and scratched off the nasty bullet.

It didn't even surprise him as the teacher said nothing about the bullies trying to interrupt the test.

More time passed and Bryan was struggling with the two last exercises when he heard Mr. Suarez walking to someone to pick up the finished test. Of course it was no one else than Molly. That only motivated and kinda depressed the boy at the same time. He needed some extra mental support for trying to solve it but at the same time he realized how badly he got prepared for this exam. He couldn't blame anyone else but himself for that. Looking down he gritted his teeth and squeezed the pencil rather hard.

The idea of not being able to train with Hikari pierced his head causing him to moan in shame. He patted his cheeks to snap out of the gloomy thoughts and concentrated once again.

He didn't know how but before Mr. Suarez announced the end, he managed to solve the last problem. Well, if he did it correctly.

Letting out a sigh of relief he leaned back and rested his spine on the chair. Now the only thing left for him was to wait patiently for the results. Something was telling him though that at least he passed it.

When all the paper sheets has been collected by Mr. Suarez, he stood before the students in his class and cleared his throat.

'I'll announce the results on our next class, later this week. I hope you did a bueno work here.'

With that the man left the classroom and let the kids enjoy their free time.

Before Bryan did anything he noticed someone sitting on his table. The culprit was wearing a thigh-high denim overalls over a white shirt, unhooked and hanging from her waist. The boy glanced up and smirked.

'And I was about to say that Milton has some nice legs.'

'Why thank you-', Mandy smiled in goofy way, 'Why Milton?'

'He shot me with those spit-balls so I guessed he's gonna have a small chat with me as well'

'Oh right... what a douche...', she said that in more quiet tone so the bully wouldn't hear her, 'So how was your test?'

'I guess I'll pass it which is a good thing. I gotta thank Molly for that some day, but how about you?', he looked at her, slightly worried.

'I'll be fine-'

'You sure? You didn't seem like writing anything-'

'If it's true, I'm gonna be really pissed-'

Bryan glanced over his shoulder to notice none else than Milton standing next to them. The way he looked at these two gave them the impression that he's king around here. Then they noticed plasters that were securely wrapped around his broken nose. Now that made him look less mighty than he wanted to be seen as.

'What do you want?', the icy blue-eyed boy glared at him.

'I'm just saying that I'm gonna be really pissed if I find out that this little stinkard has not written even a single thing and passed once again', the bully sneered.

Now that caught Bryan's interest. Furrowing he paused for a while, collecting his thoughts. Mandy on the other hand glared at the other boy, as a way to say "Leave us alone". Her sister was quietly watching the whole situation not knowing what to do.

'What do you mean she "passed the test not writing anything?"

'That this little ginger rat doesn't even seem to be capable of doing simple calculations at class because Mr. Suarez never asks her to solve the problems on the board.', he rolled eyes and tucked fists into his pant pockets.

'Since when are you so interested in my personal life anyway?', she tried to play it cool, 'I thought that you don't give a crap about orphans'

'Sure I don't, as long as they don't affect my life'

With that the other two bullies joined Milton and gathered around them. Bryan eyed them for a moment while noticing the atmosphere getting heavy. Molly was afraid to say anything, so as not to make the things worse.

'And I take that I affect your life in some way? Oh please...', she looked at him indulgently.

'No, seriously, I work hard my ass off to get decent notes while you slack off and pass the classes with minimum effort. That can't be even noticed? And now you're telling me you probably didn't write anything at all?'

Mandy bit her lower lip and jumped from Bryan's table.

'I'm afraid that's none of your business', she pierced Milton's hazel eyes with hers.

'Is that so? You're getting on my nerves with your little sister as well.', he spat, 'You orphans always get special treatment for some reason. That's what I hate about you all.'

Bryan was trying his best on keeping himself down while listening to what Milton was saying.

'Yeah, normal kids don't get any special treatment and depend only on their own skills', Chen rolled eyes about and made a disgusted face.

'Exactly, like I said that's what I can't stand. You guys can do nothing and be useless trash but when you make your sad eyes and tell how it's hard to live without your mommy and daddy around, teachers just eat it up and let you be. This makes me wanna puke', he scoffed getting closer to the redhead.

Mandy made a few steps back until her back hit another table that was in her way of escaping. The other kids remained silent and pretended that they don't care about what's going on. They were most likely scared of Milton.

She gulped and looked around, trying to spot any way of getting out of the classroom.

Milton closed the distance between her and him, close enough to the point that he could count up all of her freckles. Bryan stood up barely containing the anger rising in his heart. The two other bullies shielded their boss's back as they gathered around Fury.

Then Molly swiftly decided to do something by running out of the class to call teachers for help. She did so only because the boy took the attention of Chen and Eloy.

'Hey boss, that redhead filth ran to get some help.' the Mexican remarked noticing her escape.

Milton eyed Mandy for a bit, then looked behind his shoulder to his comrades and then shifted his eyes back at her.

'You better have written something on your test, you little rat.', he narrowed his eyebrows at her and then turned to get back at his place. 'Leave 'em alone for now'

Chen and Eloy nodded their heads and followed him to the back of the classroom where their seats were.

Bryan made sure for the entire time that they wouldn't do anything else when supposedly 'backing out'. Then he get closer to Mandy to check if she's okay. He could tell she was frightened even though she played it cool and looked calm at the first glance. Her chest was moving in and out from her heavy breathing and she held the edges of the table she was cornered at.

'You okay?', the dark haired boy asked with concern.

'Y-yeah… That was close' She let out a sigh of relief and scratched her head trying to put a good face on a bad business.

He wanted to ask her about Milton's earlier implication of Mandy's cheating, but then the teacher, along with Molly, arrived and he had no chance of talking to her to the end of the classes. He couldn't concentrate very well because of the thoughts he kept on having in his mind. Deciding to free his head from them he started scribbling something in his notepad. Looking through the window he sighed and glanced over the Adams sisters for the last time. He was surprised how quick the rest of his day went.

* * *

'Let's go outside to eat something. It's on me.'

Hikari was standing next to Bryan with her hands pocketed into her jeans pants. She seemed to be in a good mood, judging from the offer she just made and her smiling face.

The boy glanced at her with puzzled look. He just got back from the school and was about to lie in his bed a bit but then she entered his room. Blinking he slowly sat on the bed and tilted the head on the side.

'Huh? Why? Didn't you say earlier you're rather picky about spending money?', the boy wondered.

'Well, that's true but-', she paused for a second before continuing 'Molly told me about the test and she's sure after taking a quick glance at your sheet that you've answered most of the problems correctly'

Bryan's eyes widened in excitation.

'Really? So we can get back on training again?'

'Sadly no, I need to see the paper before my eyes with a passing mark first.', the woman said that rather strongly, letting the boy know to not talk back to her on that case.

His sad look spoke for himself without him even needing to actually talk. Hikari sighed and then sat down next to him casually while gingerly smiling and still keeping her hands in pockets.

'Still, I've decided it'd be nice to go to the nearest park and get ourselves some cotton candy. Kids here rarely eat it'

That caught his attention. Looking at her with strangely hungry-looking, shining ice blue eyes he almost leaned himself to lie on her.

'Can we?'

'Sure.', the woman smiled widely and patted his head, 'I'll be waiting for you before the entrance door in the next 20 minutes so get ready, okay?'

The boy nodded in excitement and begun preparing himself once she stood up and went away. It's been years since he's eaten one.

* * *

'You're ready? Shall we go now?', Hikari asked Bryan as she saw him walking towards her and Adams sisters.

What surprised him was the fact the twins were present there as well. Mandy even managed to wave at him happily.

'They're going as well?', the boy furrowed and pocketed his hands looking rather skeptical about the unexpected company.

Molly shifted her glasses a bit at his statement.

'Well, miss Hikari asked us as well.', the girl quickly explained.

'Yeah, I owned her some thanks so I decided to invite her.', Hikari smiled widely and put hands at the sides of her hips.

'And Mandy?', Bryan raised an eyebrow at the other twin.

'Well… She has a strong tie with Molly, it would be unfair to leave her alone. Also… We should leave now, you have school tomorrow and you need some time to study, right?'

Mandy grinned at the boy and embraced her sister. He only sighed heavily on that deciding to let go. He wasn't fond of the idea of Mandy getting a prize as well, especially when he saw her slacking off at the test. One thing couldn't leave his mind. As much as he didn't care about Milton, he got interested when the bully said that the girl's not solving any problems at math classes. This was unusual. As they walked he kept on glancing on the older twin. She was grinning all the way and holding Molly's hand as if she has no worries in this world. Hikari on the other hand led before them with a calm yet stern face.

After some time they finally got into the place of their destination which was nothing else than a small park. There were a lot of lovey-dovey couples and kids with their parents. Bryan looked away and focused his sight on the path under his feet. He didn't even wander around parks like that with his mom before so it was quite painful to him. If not painful then at least really unpleasant.

Catching his sudden change of mood, Hikari slightly slowed down so she could line up with Bryan and teasingly stroked his hair. The boy looked up at her just when she managed to take her hand away but he did see the smile sent at him. He smiled back at her slightly awkwardly.

'Oh, I see the cotton candy stand!', Mandy clapped her hands and turned forward at them while pointing in the direction of balloons and a small group of people.

Bryan looked there as well and got taken back by the sight of enormous helium balloons floating high in the sky. All of them were shiny and colourful. They were in multiple shapes and sizes too. The kid side in his heart was screaming to at least be able to touch them or hold one of them for a second but quickly he shook off the idea from his head.

'Can we get the biggest portion?', the redhead girl was still over excited.

Molly on the other hand was smiling quietly but also gave the same pleading look at the overseer. Hikari scratched her head as she thought and nodded her head in approval.

'Very well, just make sure you'll eat the dinner later otherwise Mr. Richards will kill me.', she giggled and searched her pocket for the wallet.

Bryan noticed a small girl carrying a rather big portion of the sweet treat with her dad. The size was sure concrete to stimulate his apetite.

'The biggest share is for about 1.75$ right? Molly, I'll give you some coins and you'll buy them for us, okay?'

'Of course!', the girl happily reached out hands to get the money but then Bryan stepped forward.

'How about Mandy doing it? She seemed excited about eating one.', he said while eyeing the older sister.

'But it's Molly who always pays and gets them for us.'

'So it would be a nice change if you went and paid for them yourself, right?', the boy didn't want to let go of it 'I don't get what's so difficult about that.'

'It's not a big problem to me, I can still do it-', Molly carefully cut in.

Mandy just bit her lower lip and escaped her look from the boy. He could tell she was getting nervous for some reason.

'Bryan, let it go-', Hikari handed the money over to Molly.

'What are you scared of? People? Talking to a stranger? Guess not…', he paused for a bit and stuffed his hands casually into his pants and looked up into the sky 'I wonder if it has something to do with counting up money.'

Mandy didn't say a word, so did the rest. Her younger sister looked down clutching the coins in her hand while Hikari furrowed a bit.

'Hey Mandy tell me how much it's 1.75$ x 4? I'm sure you can calculate that in your head.', Bryan looked at her with a sly grin.

'I…', she stammered starting to look panicked.

She opened her mouth to say something but nothing came out.

'So you can't solve this problem? How come? Even smaller kids are able to do that.', he said that in a mocking tone 'Seriously, are you that stupid?'

He expected her to flip over his statement but instead she trembled as she sniffed while rubbing her eyes. It lasted for maybe a second or two and then she ran away.

'Mandy!', Hikari gasped and chased after her 'You two stay here!'

Bryan blinked in astonishment, not knowing what happened. He wasn't expecting her to be THAT sensitive. When he looked at Molly it was her who was looking really angry. She threw the coins at him and stomped hard on the ground in anger.

'You moron! How could you say that to her?'

The boy barely shielded himself from the attack so the coins still hit him hard on the head and arms. Wincing he rubbed his forehead and gave her a lost look.

'I didn't know she would cry like a little kid when being called a stupid!', he hissed and made a pained expression.

'You shouldn't have been pushing that matter so hard in a first place! You don't have any idea about us you lucky sissy!', Molly crouched down to start collecting the coins that she threw at him, occasionally sniffing and shifting her glasses back at her nose.

Bryan didn't say anything to that. Closing his hands in fists he looked away not wanting to admit that he was hurt by what the girl said. Holding up his pride he crouched down as well and helped her.

The two were silent after that, letting themselves to cool down. When they were done, Molly first stood up and then walked towards one of the free benches she saw at the sides of the path and sat on the right while the boy soon afterwards joined her in silence. The girl hide the coins in her small skirt pockets and then placed her hands on her knees sitting properly like a well mannered girl. Bryan on the other hand was keeping his hands in his pants pockets trying to look casually and calm. He turned at his left for a while to see Hikari comforting Mandy on the bench a few yards away. Feeling relieved she's safe now he looked back at the other redhead.

'Uhh, you know-', he carefully started to talk again.

'You were right.'

The boy looked at her to see her sad yet collected face.

'Mandy can't solve up anything that is above from counting on her own fingers.', she made a pause after that to let her words sink a bit.

Bryan seemed to be interested about finding out the reason.

'Why?'

Another pause.

'We were brought to the orphanage for a reason. Probably if that had never happened we wouldn't be there.'

Before the boy was able to ask she continued on her own.

'We were raised in a rather poor family with low living standards. Our mother… Was a drug addict. They dug her own grave. Other than that she was a really good parent to us. She wasn't spending a lot of time with us because she was either outside in some kind of a valley losing her consciousness or sleeping in the bed. We never really did any family stuff together but she really cared about me and my sister… When she had a chance she used to embrace us and tried to gather enough of money for new clothes or school supply for us.'

Bryan nodded slightly to himself and looked down. He could kinda relate to her, at least with his mother doing his best to keep provide money for food and the most needed things.

'She didn't even have a part-time job, she tried to take whichever work was on. Our dad had a full-time job in a really small company. He used to unload and unpack products in a supermarket. He also cleaned there from time to time but he was addicted to the alcohol. We never knew why he did that. When we were around 6 years old our mother died from the drug overdose. We heard it was because of the stress. Our father didn't let us to go to the funeral though and we have never seen her corpse as well. He probably decided the sight would be too much for us…', she paused again now to take a deeper breath and clutched her fists harder trying her best to stay calm.

Closing her eyes for a longer while she decided to continue.

'More than a year ago later our father started to drink more. He's never been interested into taking care of us. We were always relying on ourselves in everything. At school we were always alone and alienated. Other kids didn't talk to us because the rumors about our mother dying from drug overdose quickly spreaded and their parents prohibited them to talk to us. Then we had a school assignment to draw something about our family or something. I don't even remember what we drew but it worried our home teacher so she decided to visit our father to check if everything's alright. Later that day when we got back, he was really angry at us for causing people to get interested into our family issues. He of course said everything was okay to her so she wouldn't call the cops or anything but… Later he unloaded his anger on us.'

Bryan snapped his head quickly at her with his eyes widened in horror.

'He was yelling at us. Throwing empty beer bottles everywhere. He was completely drunk and then when I tried to calm him down he raised a hand to hit me. Instead of me, he knocked Mandy down who shielded me. The impact was that strong so she collapsed on the ground and hit her head by the edge of the table. I… Don't remember much. I was afraid, she stopped moving, her eyes were half closed… I don't even know how I asked for help and how we got into the hospital. Our father escaped before I called for the ambulance…', Molly looked down and wiped off the humidity under her glasses 'At the hospital Mandy got a complicate head surgery. The doctor said she was lucky enough to survive that. Her skull got crushed in the place of a hit and her brain was slightly damaged. I was really happy to find her talking to me again after she woke up. She protected me and could have died back then but she made it after all.'

The boy couldn't believe in what he heard. He really didn't know a single thing about the Adams twins. He felt really bad for judging them.

'And because of the brain damage…', he continued.

'Yes, because of the brain damage she's unable to make calculations. One day I brought some kind of quizzes and school stuff for her when I heard she's doing better. She stared at the book and couldn't say anything for a while. Then she announced she can't calculate anything. She forgot how to do that and she couldn't use her brain to multiply or add things in her head. Doctors assumed that since she managed to remain the ability to walk and talk she's alright but she was not. They wanted to put her in a special class but that would mean the two of us would be separated and they didn't want to risk it so they allowed my sister to graduate to the another year so she could stay with me. Only us, Hikari and the teachers know about Mandy. Her hair shaved back then grew back and when she had her first they at the new school no one else noticed a thing. '

'I see…', Bryan looked down again gently kicking off some gravel under his feet.

'And you know what? She never said she regrets taking that hit. ', Molly smiled under the small tears and shook her head a little, 'She always protects me no matter what.'

They boy gazed at her for a moment and bit his lower bit while turning his head back.

'That's why you're an ace in math?'

The redhead giggled for a bit.

'I'm not an ace but I admit I study hard for my sister's sake. She said she wants to be a scientist one day because molecules and such are cool.'

'Sheesh, this sure sounds Mandy like.', Bryan chuckled as well feeling that the tension between them is gone now.

'Yeah. That's all I can do for her anyway. I really hope she'll reach her dreams one day.'

The silence entered once again their conversation and stayed there until they noticed Hikari and Mandy slowly approaching their bench. Molly quickly stood up and walked towards them to see if her sister is okay. Bryan felt uneasy because he knew he acted like a rude little bastard and judged her without any idea. Though seeing the twins embracing each other made him felt a little bit better. Meeting his gaze with the half Asian he saw something in her eyes that he couldn't name. She was looking stern or maybe not really. Maybe it was disappointment after all?

Yanking the stare he looked at the Mandy who wasn't hugging with her sister now. Standing up he quietly walked over her not looking into her eyes. Nervously scratching the back of his head he concentrated into looking at the ground.

'Hey uhh… I'm sorry for calling you stupid. It was really ru-'

The girl without saying a word embraced him as well and gently laid her head on his shoulder. Bryan, dumbfounded on the other hand blushed from the sudden touch and looked at Molly for finding some clues. She nodded at him, encouraging him to embrace her as well. After some time with taking a deep breath he slowly put his arms around her back to keep her close.

'There there…'

Mandy looked up at him, forgiving for what he said earlier. When they released the hold of each other she grabbed one of his hands and started to run towards the cotton candy stand.

'Whoa..!'

'C'mon! I wanna eat some candy floss already!', she giggled and continued running still holding his hand.

'Hey, wait for me! I have half of the money!', Molly chased after the two of them as well.

The blush on Bryan's face was still present because of the warm feeling of the girl's hand. For some reason it didn't bother him back then. Seeing her laughing face was the most important thing for him. He didn't even need to say that aloud but deep inside he decided to protect her as much as he could to never lose the grip of her hand.

-the tape starts shattering and blanking out with the faint image of the three kids eating big shares of candy floss-


	6. Chapter 6, The scent of snowdrops

I'm sorry for the late update. The chapter has been ready for over a month but the gramatical errors were horrible. That horrible so my friend reflected himself to proofread the chapter for me to spare you the torture of seeing them. Unfortunatelly he edited like 3-4 pages of the document and I had to do the rest. But I've tried really hard and I know it's not perfect but it's way, WAY better than the beta version. I've proofread the chapters 1-3 and 5 to improve them slightly and making the first three written with the style I later developed, also eliminating any errors I spotted. I hope they'll be easier for you guys to follow. Also the chapter 7 is on its way and I should finish it even this month so stay tuned!

* * *

**Chapter 6, 'The scent of snowdrops'**

-the tape sets on the school building then slowly focuses on the window to the classroom where Bryan is having his math class-

'Well, well… Seems like everyone has passed. _Felicitaciones_ _mis niños._'

Mr. Suarez was standing before the kids with a pile of test sheets. Even though he tried to sound caring and proud of his students, they all knew he was just faking it. The smile on his chubby, slightly sweating face from the hot temperature, was also forced for the moment.

Bryan's eyes studied the man's features again. Every single time he did that, he felt disgusted. His math teacher with whom he had the most trouble was also the head master of this little school. That fact alone made him feel nervous and sick around him, Mr. Suarez appearance didn't make it any better. Slowly moving his gaze, the boy glanced at Mandy who seemed like she didn't give a crap about the results from the looks of things. She seemed also to have forgotten about their quarrel last Monday and acted through the whole past few days like if nothing happened.

'As usual, the person who completed the exam with a perfect score is none other than Molly. The runner up with only one point less is Adam. Good job you two.', ending his speech there, the teacher began to give back the exams with marks on them.

Surprisingly he wasn't lazy and classified the papers in the order that the kids were sitting in their desks, so he only had to pull out his hand with a sheet before moving to the next pupil in a manner almost robot-like.

Bryan noticed how widely was Molly grinning when she saw the big, red A+ mark on her work. He knew she deserved that. Before he noticed, Mr. Suarez stood before him and presented the boy his results.

'Not bad for the first time, mi _chico_. But it was the last time I allowed you to write further after you _miró_ on Molly's test.'

Young Fury glared angrily at him, knowing he wasn't cheating at all but once he saw a C+ mark he smiled slightly to himself. He got a positive and a fairly decent score. Now he was sure, Hikari will let them practice kickboxing again. He heard a few 'ah' and 'ooh!' sounds as other kids were getting their sheets back. But he was silent. Keeping his little victory deep in his heart.

Yesterday he was told by Mr. Suarez that he doesn't know if he'll make his test valid which upset Bryan greatly, but mostly made him felt scared. Now he can relax.

After a few minutes the teacher was standing before the kids and discussed the results and gave the explanations to the hardest problem. Making sure they more or less got what's that about he moved into his lesson plan.

'I hope that the next _examen_ will be written better. You can start preparing from today. _Adios._', the man announced when the school bell rang in the corridors announcing classes to end.

'About time…', Bryan murmured to himself and stretched his back muscles a bit.

He hated sitting into one particular place for a long time without making any move. When he was about to pack his stuff into the backpack, his notebook accidentally slid down on the floor. While leaning down and grabbing it he noticed three pairs of the legs marching up next to Mandy's desk.

'Yo ginger rat, gimme your test sheet-'

The voice was that characteristic that he didn't even need to rise his head and see who said that.

'Leave me alone.', the older twin ignored Milton completely and kept on preparing to go.

Other kids were hurriedly getting out from the class right after Mr. Suarez just if they were pretending to not be a part of the upcoming turmoil.

'I said to give me your test sheet, are you def or something?', the boy raised his tone while slamming his hand into the top of the desk.

'Stop harming us or else I'm gonna call Mr. Suarez-', Molly decided to take an action as well.

The bullies laughed at her statement making her feel really uncomfortable and doubtful.

'You gonna do what? Call him and say what? That your sister cheated on the test because she's an orphan? You two are really getting on my nerves.', he stepped closer eyeing the twin evilly.

'You think you two will escape? Not a chance.', Eloy chuckled while cracking his chubby fingers for the warm-up.

'Leave them alone.', Bryan raised from the floor with his fists clenched and ready.

The boy with the fancy hairdo whistled out of the pure amazement.

'You wanna get yourself into trouble? Feel always welcomed to get a free thresh you dud.', Milton sneered happily making his friends join his laughter.

Seeing her chance to flee, Mandy quickly brought the backpack close to her and tried to run away but the bully grabbed her belongings in the right moment causing her stop.

'I'll take this.', grinning he begun to raid her bag by turning it up and shaking off all of the content.

'Stop this!', the black-haired boy lounged to prevent him from doing that but was caught by the Eloy and Chen.

Molly was frantically looking around feeling totally helpless for what was happening.

'Hand it back!', Mandy's face got red from the anger.

'Oh here we go.', Milton fished out the test sheet and stared at it with wide-eyed.

'HAND IT BACK YOU SPOILED BASTARD!', the older twin jumped to reach it from the bully's hand feeling really embarrassed and scared to have him know the truth.

'Let me go-!', Bryan yelped in pain as the bullies performed a hooking grasp on his shoulders from his back making him unable to do anything.

It was around the time when the red haired girl grabbed the test sheet back and awkwardly backed up on shaky legs. The boss seemed to be furious. As furious as he has never been seen.

'You little ginger cheater! You've crossed the damn line!'

It was maybe a flash of a moment but Bryan's eyes registered it almost in slow motion – the time when Milton raised his hand to punch scared Mandy into her head and send her off to the class floor. The grip of the two other boys loosened when they heard the girl's scream. She was clutching her head tight while curling up and crying aloud. Molly almost in an instant gathered all of the courage she has sealed within her deep inside and hurried to her sister while evading the torturer. He himself was dumbfounded in the shock not knowing what to do.

'Stop acting up you little shit! I know you're acting!', Milton was looking all around the classroom feeling really nervous and uncomfortable but trying to hide it and play cool.

'She's not acting you idiot! She had a serious skull damage not too long ago and you punched her! You have crossed the line of what you can do in this school!', Molly screamed at him at the top of her lungs.

All of the scene was a big, freaking chaos. Mandy was crying from the pain, still yelping aloud from time to time, her younger sister was trying to help her by gently touching her arm to make her less scared. The bullies were just standing there with their eyes widely open. Milton's face got sweaty as he imagined himself getting into big troubles if teachers found out about that. Bryan on the other hand felt like his whole body was frozen. He barely blinked at all. The rest went fluently. One of the teachers heard the cries and run to call the ambulance and someone from the orphanage. Soon enough even Mr. Suarez rushed into the classroom frantically covering his mouth from the nerves and looking around. The whole show was one big mess.

The boy hasn't even registered all of the words he was hearing around him. He saw Mandy weakly walking on her shaky legs with a support from her teacher and sister towards the door, Milton and the bullies were taken by the headmaster. Nobody paid attention to him. Just like if he wasn't present back then. What shook him off from the numbness was the cry from outside the window and the noise of ambulance riding away from the school building. He wasn't sure but he could swear he saw collapsing Mandy for a brief second. He felt like his heart stopped beating and the time stopped on flowing.

It was only him and the empty class which appearance slowly changed as the sun was setting down with every minutes that passed. It was the beginning of the fall, that was why the days have started to appear to be shorter. Bryan was still standing on his petrified legs while looking down in shame. He hasn't felt that miserable since his mother's death. He did nothing to prevent his friend from getting hurt. He was so helpless.

He would continue on blaming himself if it wasn't a cleaner who get with a mop and a bucket of water into the class, ready to wipe the floors and make it all set for Monday. The boy slowly took his backpack and headed out . He only saw the woman opening her mouth to probably ask him why he was still there but he didn't pay attention to that. He was mindless at the time, not taking any record from the surroundings around him. Like a puppet he slowly walked pass through the school corridors, his hollow eyes never picking up anything.

There was nobody waiting for him downstairs. The overseer must've forgotten about him this time again. He felt unwanted, unneeded. Did he really belong here? To the orphanage? He had a doubt in his mind about that. Looking up into the sky he slightly frowned and then rubbed his nose into the sleeve. Sniffing aloud he decided to go back anyway.

He saw Milton and his parents getting into their car, Chen walking away alone with his head down and Eloy with his father yelling at him as the two got back from Mr. Suarez. The bullies seemed to be looking slightly different. They weren't overconfident with their actions anymore. All of them looked scared, insecure and miserable. Much like Bryan now.

The boy shook his head and ignored what he just saw, continuing his path to the orphanage.

By the time he got in, nobody really paid attention that he arrived. Front corridor was almost empty though he knew that kids were around as he heard some faint noises and laughs. Furrowing he walked into his room and tossed his backpack with a force into the wall. Soon after he slammed the door behind him and fell on the bed, face down. Grabbing his pillow close to himself, he curled up squeezing his eyelids hard. He was about to cry when the memory of his dad crossed his mind. It was one of the very faint memories of him that he treasured deep into his heart. To think more about it, it was the earliest memory he ever remembered.

He was around 4 years old, maybe a few weeks less when that happened. His knee was in pain as he thorn away the protective skin tissue, revealing a nasty, bleeding scratch. He was crying like any kid when being hurt and then his dad crouched next to him and gently stroked his head, encouraging him.

'Don't cry, you're a strong boy and strong boys don't cry over some minor scratches.'

'B-But it h-hurts…', the boy stammered bringing back his little fists to his face, ready to wipe off tears.

'Your daddy doesn't cry when he's hurt during his patrol, see?', the man showed the boy a nasty looking scar on his arm and smiled at him.

'You… D-don't?'

'Yeah, I don't and I didn't back then. You're a tough boy, Bryan and if you want to be like your daddy you have to be strong to overcome the pain.', Mr. Fury patted the boy's head for the last time and kept his hand for a while.

Bryan sniffled aloud and glanced right into his eyes and then slowly nodded.

'I know you can do this. You'll be just like your daddy one day-'

Here his memory ended. It was all blurry and he wasn't sure if he remembered everything that was said back then. The one thing he was sure about was his dad telling him to not cry over some pain, because he's a strong boy, just like him. He sat on the bed and rubbed his eyes to get rid of small tears that gathered into his eyes and patted his cheeks to snap out of the crybaby mood.

'What should I do?', he thought to himself and looked around his room realizing that he should tell Hikari about his test results.

After that he rushed to his bag and pulled out the paper sheet which was nearly all creased.

'Whoops-'

Bryan swiftly and in crafty way smoothed the surface of it on the back of the text book and neatly folded in half. Smiling to himself, being proud of what he just did, marched out his room to find her.

He peeked almost everywhere he thought she could have been. She wasn't with smaller kids or on the back yard and kids didn't see her either.

The boy sat on the upstairs and supported his chin with hands, looking gloomily. He thought he's gonna find her somewhere and ask her to continue training him but he wasn't successful with his looking for her. Sighing aloud he shook his head.

'Yo kiddo, why are you sitting here all alone, hmmm?'

Turning his head to see who's behind him he saw no one else than Berta with her significant smile, proudly holding a vacuum cleaner.

'Oh, hi Berta-', Bryan stood up looking quite surprised at her presence.

'Why aren't you playing with others outside? It's Friday, kids here crave for some freedom and fun.', glancing at him she brought the machine closer to her, making sure the wire knot is also close.

He didn't say anything. He got used to stay alone and mind his own business since the loss of his father. He rarely played with other kids and if he did, it was mostly right after school when he knew his mother is going to be back pretty late anyways.

'You some tough cookie, hun. I know what's gonna bring your smile.', the black woman left the vacuum sitting next to the wall and looked into her apron pocket for something and then reached out a hand towards him, 'Here-'

The boy gave her a puzzled look but actually reached out for it. When she released her grasp he saw two big and colourful bonbons. The wrapping papers were all shiny and made him hungry just by looking at them.

'Why-?'

'These make people happy really fast. Everyone loves them.'

'And why two?', Bryan looked at his opened hand and back at her.

'If you don't wanna eat the two, you can give one to someone you like.', Berta gave him a wide smile and patted his arm, 'Now if you excuse me, I've some work to do.'

The boy looked at her for the last time and then lowered his head, feeling slightly embarrassed. The woman left and he slowly tucked the bonbons into his pants pocket and decided to check if Hikari is in her room, upstairs.

He knocked the door once. There was no reply. Then he knocked the door twice. There was again no reply. Confused and slightly irritated he pulled out the handle and got in. There was no one as he expected. For some reason he forgot about all of the ethics about not going into someone's room without their approval but that was exactly what was he doing right now. Closing the door he stood in the middle taking a look at the furniture around him. When Hikari wasn't around the room seemed to be different. The atmosphere was usually normal and light around her but now he felt slightly disturbed and sad. It was incredibly quiet here and dark, even though she had a small window at the attic. He noticed the same photo frame lying on the commode on his left.

Bryan couldn't understand why she kept it turned down. Just like if she didn't want to look on it purposely and yet she kept it in her room. Not waiting any longer he reached out for the frame and looked at the covered picture. His eyes widened as he saw something he didn't really expect. On the photograph there was a girl. She seemed to be younger than him now, probably around 7-8 years old. Her hair was the colour of dirty blonde and her eyes chocolate brown. She was sitting on the rock near some waterfall or something, dressed into some shorts, a tank top and a hat. The boy was sure that he hasn't seen someone like her before in the orphanage so he had no idea why Hikari would keep a picture of that girl in her bedroom. The only idea that crossed his mind was that she could've been someone close to her, like another kid she had looked after or some friend. The two weren't alike so there was no chance of them being siblings or relatives but still he didn't know the reason why the photo would be covered.

Sighing he decided to put the frame as it was so Hikari won't get angry at him for looking at it. The last thing he noticed about the girl was the fact she had a visible sadness in her eyes even though she was smirking. Feeling uneasy he left the photograph and shook off the image of her from his head and looked in some other direction. What he saw was a punching bag, hanging there and ready to use. It tempted him enough to leave the test sheet he carried along with him and put on his gloves that were lying in the corner near the training spot. Not having even a single doubt, he decided to train on his own.

Firstly he tried out all of the moves that he was taught by his guardian. Then he pulled out more sophisticated combinations he remembered from Hikari's training session.

With every punch or kick he felt how the emotions flew within him, opening his hard shield around him. The training went for almost an hour without any pause. The droplets of sweat were present on his clothes around the collar and mostly on his face and neck. Bryan didn't care about that. The only thing that was in his mind was to give all of his best now, trying to unload all of the pain he held deep inside.

Soon afterwards the raw punches and kicks weren't enough. He started to scream with every strike and then added bitter words between his heavy panting.

'I hate you!'

A strike.

'You fucker!'

Another strike.

'For everything you've done to her!'

The bag swung violently again.

'I hate seeing her sad!'

'I hate this orphanage!'

'I hate my miserable life!'

'I hate feeling so damn useless!'

'I hate… myself!'

He screamed aloud and then he heard another scream.

'Bryan, stop!'

He indeed stopped but in a wrong time. The training bag was put in such motion so it bounced right into confused and exhausted boy, knocking him off on the ground with a loud thud.

Before him stood Hikari who seemed to be present here for some time but he was too consumed by his training to pay attention to what was surrounding him.

Bryan lied motionless on the floor, steady on his back while breathing harshly and screaming between his cries. The only difference was the lack of tears. The woman hurriedly walked to him and kneeled down in order to pick him up from the floor. Then she brought him close to herself in a tight embrace.

The boy was still yelping and twitching from time to time but he sounded less painful or angry.

'It's okay now. It's alright…', Hikari gently whispered while caressing his wet from the sweat back and rested her cheek on his head.

'Hikari…', the boy quietly wept.

The weeping slowly has become more quiet and his breath less chaotic. The twitching also has stopped. The bag was hanging still at time when he calmed down.

Feeling it's a right time she gingerly pulled him away from her so she could look at his face. All she saw was his fringe covering most of his face from that angle as he was looking down.

The woman sighed aloud while still keeping her hands on his shoulders.

'Bryan-', she started and took another breath, 'I was with Mandy at the hospital.'

He didn't look back at her.

'She's okay now. We got back together. She's in her room with Molly, resting-'

The boy started to rub his face with his long sleeves mostly to clean his nose and get rid of tears that began to sting his eyes. Seeing that she slightly smiled to herself and put her hands back on her lap, taking her time to observe him getting over the news. More minutes passed and she finally stood up and picked up a clean towel she had prepared for her upcoming training session. Seeing how miserable her pupil looked, she decided it'll serve a better use for him. She crouched back in front of him and rubbed his wet hair into the soft fabric. Bryan looked at her putting his hands down that were covering his face before.

He seemed like a one big, walking mess which made Hikari giggle out of the sympathy.

For some reason she felt she should scold him for getting into her room without a question and for calling her just by the name but she decided to let go. When she was sure his hair is almost dry she put away the boxing gloves out of his sweaty hands.

'There you go, Mr. Bryan. You're all ready to take a refreshing shower.', she gestured to him, encouraging to go to the bathroom half faking the serious tone.

The boy gave her his puzzled look and he slightly moved the towel to make it swing on his shoulders.

'Don't worry about the towel, you can keep it. It was straight from the washing.', she stood up helping him to do the same, 'Now, shoo, shoo-'

Bryan self aware slightly nodded and decided to do as he was asked and left the room without saying anything to Hikari. When he was away she put fists on sides of her hips and sighed out aloud again.

'Really, since he has come here I'm way more busy than before.', she shook her head while talking to herself.

When she was about to lie on the bed to get some rest after the hospital trip she noticed the folded paper on the floor. Grabbing it lazily she read the content and slightly smiled.

'Something tells me that he's worth the effort none the less.'

The woman stretched out the muscles all over her body and shifted her position to lie on the side now, getting ready for some nap.

* * *

Bryan walked past the corridor near the sector where he thought girl's rooms were. Not being sure if he's right or anything he peeked into the slightly opened door to look inside. He saw Mandy lying in the bed and Molly sitting next to her, holding her hand. She was most likely sleeping peacefully now. He could have gotten inside but he decided to walk away, not feeling too confident about the sisters actually wanting to see him. He felt guilty for what happened. That feeling was still present since the accident in school and even spending some time with Hikari and screaming out all of the bitter things inside of him didn't help much in that case.

Sighing, he marched right to his room to pick up his pajamas and headed to the shower cabins. It was still around the time where other kids were playing outside so he didn't have to wait for his turn. Actually taking a shower wasn't a bad idea after all. Putting his clothes aside he stepped into the cabin, rolled the curtain to hide himself and turned the warm water on.

* * *

The orphanage was getting quiet due to the late hour. It was about to hit 11 PM and it was dark outside. It was actually pretty cloudy too so the moon wasn't present on the sky. The youngest kids were already asleep while the oldest ones were still preparing to go to bed actually or to chitchat quietly with the lights turned off, just in case to not bait the overseer.

Bryan didn't feel sleepy at all. Well, he did a little bit but his mind was troubled enough to shook off the idea of putting himself into slumber. This whole day remembered him of the first day since he got here or the day of his mother's death. He sat with his legs brought close to his torso, face buried into his arms. He wasn't about to cry but the miserable feeling couldn't let go of him. He barely ate anything for dinner, let alone played or enjoyed the Friday afternoon.

The lights were off already to give out the impression of him sleeping. He didn't want to cause another fuss around him. Hoping that nobody would open the door, he closed his eyes and braced himself into his protective little corner of comfort, building up another shell around him.

Then his personal area got disturbed as Hikari opened the door to check on him. She saw him sitting on the bed and definitely not sleeping. She made a few steps inside before closing the door behind her.

'You're not going to sleep?'

There was no reply.

'Bryan…', the woman sat on the other side of the bed while making sure her head won't hit the bottom of the upper mattress of the bunk bed.

She sealed her eyes in his direction though it was dark enough to make her unable to see his features. She was afraid to have him back into that part where he's rejecting help from anyone else.

'Bryan… It's not your fault. Don't blame yourself for that-', she softly started.

'Don't say things like if you knew me!', the boy curled up even more, protecting himself from the rest of the world.

Hikari sighed. It's going take a while since the boy will learn how to deal with failures and pain.

'Yes, I don't know you but I want to help you, y'know.'

'What for? You're doing that only because you were paid to look after me…', Bryan lowered his tone so the last part of his sentence was only a weak whisper.

'Actually no amount of money would buy me to look after someone that problematic and rude as your person is.', she replied sharply feeling slightly hurt because of what he said.

There was a long pause on the boy's side.

'Then why?'

'Maybe because I like you?', Hikari looked into his direction once again.

Bryan didn't form any sorts of a reply for that. It was dificult for him to accept the truth of being liked yet it made him feel happy inside for some reason.

'So maybe you'll tell me what happened today?'

'I thought that Molly already explained it to you.', he murmured under his nose not being fond about talking about the whole accident.

'She did but I want to hear it coming from you.', the guardian didn't even move her head.

'… Milton got interested into Mandy's test result so he forced her to show it to him. Chen and Eloy took me away so I couldn't do anything and then…', he gulped and looked away, 'He saw the blank paper and a decent note and punched her in the head.'

'So it's not really your fault.', Hikari stated while scratching her head a bit.

'It is! After the test I noticed that Mandy didn't write anything and talked about that with her but Milton eavesdropped and decided to check later if she's indeed passing the classes by doing nothing. He had no idea about Mandy's brain damage…'

The woman sighed and leaned back on the cold wall while putting the facts together.

'That's why you're blaming yourself?'

'If I hadn't asked her about that he wouldn't have picked up a great interest from the bullies and didn't receive a hit later.', the boy tried to see the moon through clouds but without any success.

'Oh dear… You didn't really want her to get punched and make Milton hear that, right?'

'Well…yeah-'

'So it's not your fault.'

Bryan snapped his head towards her and then sighed as well.

'But-'

'No buts. Use your head to do some cold calculation. You shouldn't feel responsible for every bad thing happening around you.'

'I didn't protect her though. I was powerless against them.', the boy hung his head down again in guilt.

'One lesson of kickboxing won't make you a superhero. It's a long process.'

'Am I ever gonna be strong enough?'

'This depends only from you, I'm just showing you a path to follow. I know you're capable of being stronger.', she continued looking straight ahead for no particular reason.

The boy remained silent again stretching out his legs after some time, still not knowing what to say back.

'I guess I can exceed your training schedule if you want…', Hikari slowly started after clearing out her throat.

'Really?', Bryan nearly jumped on the bed from the excitement.

'Yep but I won't let you slack around and get away from the extra trainings, you gotta be aware of that.'

'Deal!'

The woman noticed how he was sitting on the bed with his face towards her now, slightly closer than before. She couldn't help but to smile seeing him a bit happier again.

'Buuuut-'

'But what?', he got slightly worried.

'Tell me some more about the rest of bullies, are they the same like Milton?'

The boy thought for a moment while shifting his eyes from one part of the room to the another.

'Well, when I was getting back home I saw them after Mr. Suarez called their parents to his office…'

'And?'

'Chen was heading home alone and Eloy was only with his dad who was yelling at him all of the way back.', the boy slightly nodded to himself as he recollected the shards of his memory.

'Say- Are they starting off the fuss at the class often or they're just the company for our main star?', Hikari said the last two words ironically.

'The latter.'

'Hmm hmm…', the woman mumbled something to herself while rubbing her chin.

'Why do you ask?', Bryan was seemingly intrigued.

'Out of a pure curiosity.', she tried to sound serious even though he knew she has something up in her sleeve.

'You're not telling me the whole truth…', the boy narrowed his eyes and crossed arms on his torso.

'Of course not, you're still just a kid and I'm plotting an evil adult plan.', she quipped while stroking his hair in a provocative way.

If there was more light in the room, she would have noticed how sulky his face was and how angrily his eyes burnt. He was sick of being treated like a small kid while he felt more like a teenager, at least according to his logic.

'Don't worry, just trust me and we'll be all set.', Hikari smiled and moved her hand away.

He was still slightly mad at her but decided to let go as he didn't get any real reason to remain angry. When she was about to stand up from the bed, the boy abruptly captured one of her sleeves.

'Yes?'

'Hey will… Will you do that again?', Bryan shyly asked.

'Will I do what?'

'Cuddle me…', he whispered while looking down.

She was surprised to hear that because it was the first time someone asked her for a hug. Usually the other person just decided to do that without asking. Not to mention it was usually a really small kid.

The woman didn't know if she should give him a hug for real or just throw a joke and let it be but that time she decided to do what he asked for. She gestured with opened arms for him to get closer. Hikari didn't even have to wait long as he slowly crouched near her and found the most suitable pose for the hug.

It was the same when she embraced Bryan to calm him down with the subtle difference - the boy hugged her back and gently clutched the fabric on her back with his fingers. Hikari cuddled him back and brought close to her in a motherly way.

What she felt that time was something hard to describe with words. Part of her wanted it to be just a quick hug because of the embarrassment, while her other part wanted to stay like that forever. Instinctively she begun to caress his back and look at him lovingly, being happy to see his peaceful posture.

She couldn't believe how enjoyable was that moment where the two of them just cuddled each other and said nothing at all. Smirking to herself she closed her eyes for a while to enjoy his warmth. She wasn't sure how many minutes passed since she kept the embrace but she didn't regret that. Finding a way to slip out, she gently let him lie on the bed. She felt quite glad to have him asleep even though she moved a bit when shifting her position. Grabbing the pillow, Hikari slightly put it under his head and covered him with the blanket to make sure he won't get cold at night.

Quietly heading to the door she turned her head at him wishing the boy sweet dreams in her thoughts and left the room.

* * *

-the scene concentrates on the twin's room at the daytime, getting sharp-

Bryan was standing next to the bed where Mandy was lying and nervously rubbed the floor with the tip of his shoe. He found looking anywhere else than directly into her eyes the best option to do. The girl was glancing at him, intrigued and kinda upset to have him quiet for all the time.

'I'm sorry…', the boy quietly murmured and wandered his eyes at her face.

'It's okay, I'm not angry at you anyway.', she replied back happily.

'Did… Did it hurt?'

'Not that much, I faked the part about clutching my head from pain a bit…'

'What?', Bryan's jaw literally dropped upon hearing that, 'So it was just an act?'

'Not everything. It still hurt me and I lost consciousness for real.', Mandy shrugged and made an embarrassed face, 'No biggie. I had to do something because if I had just clutched my head, Milton would have been still yapping at me-'

'True, though you got me all sick-worried about you, you silly-', he put his hands into the pockets to look casually while trying to sound stern.

'You care that much about me Bryney? How sweet of you-', the girl smirked and her smile only widened when she saw him getting red on the face from the embarrassment.

'No biggie.', he scoffed copycatting her and turned himself back at her.

There was a long giggle which brought a small smile on his face as well.

'Thank you.'

'You're welcome.', the boy grinned while looking at her freckled cheeks then an idea came across his head.

'Hmm?'

'Gimme your hand-', Bryan asked quickly while moving one of his hands frantically into his pant pocket.

The girl did as he asked with a puzzled look. He gave her one of the bonbons he received from Berta the other day. Mandy made some really big and surprised eyes.

'It can be slightly crumbled because I fell on the ground while carrying them in my pockets but I guess it's still tasty-'

'Can I have it for real? It's like my fave!', the girl immediately sat while staring at the booty.

'Yeah, go ahead-', he scratched his head a little being half embarrassed and half happy to see her in a better mood.

'Thanks! Oh uh…'

'What is it?', the boy raised one of his eyebrows in question.

'Can you get a bit closer? I can't leave my bed for the entire weekend-', she begged with her big , green eyes.

Bryan got closer to her bed, standing almost above her.

'Lean closer.'

He did that as well closing the distance between them.

'Clo-oser-', the girl melodically begged once again.

Getting slightly nervous he almost lied his head on the same pillow as her.

'Are you happy-?', he asked furrowing.

Instead of getting a reply, he got a rather big smooch on his cheek which caught him completely off guard.

'Here's my little gift for you.', Mandy smiled sweetly at him and looked at the colourful wrapping of the bonbon.

Bryan's face got flushed with new shades of red colour he had never thought he was able to have.

'Oh, so you two are a couple now?', Molly got back and shifted her glasses a bit, eyeing them for a while.

'Who's a couple?', the boy stared at her in horror getting more embarrassed with every second.

'You two obviously.', she grinned at him and crossed her arms.

'This is not what you think it is! I just… We just- Agh damnit!', the boy covered his head in eternal shame while Mandy was happily sucking and munching on the bonbon, not caring about the rest of the world.

-the tape gets all noisy and focuses on the kid's faces respectively, staying still to show the best facial expressions of them all-

-eventually the tape shatters and goes all blank as it zoomes out-


	7. Chapter 7, The scent of lotus

I'm sorry it took me so long to update the story but I've been quite busy with my life and such and I wasn't inspired enough to finish the chapter which I started long time ago in fact. The story progress is now in the middle, slowly heading to the end which I hope I'll be able to deliver in this year. I've dissabled the option for the anonymous reviews due to the massive harassing that didn't have anything to do with the story. I'm against any kind of terrorism (yes, what they did was a terroristic attack) so I'll fight until I win. For now, please enjoy the chaper and don't forget to R&R. ~.^

* * *

**Chapter 7, 'The scent of lotus'**

-the tape slowly focuses on the orphanage and adjusts the sharpness, the scene is set on Bryan's room-

The boy was sleeping peacefully in the bed, being wrapped with warm blanket as it was slowly getting cold outside due to the fall approaching. It was slightly before six o clock in the morning when Hikari opened the door and stood in the middle. She seemed to be already dressed and ready to start the day.

'Bryan, wake up.'

There was no response from him. He obviously was fast asleep. The woman furrowed and walked over his bed to slightly shook him.

'Wake up.'

The boy muttered something and securely covered his face with blanket slightly exposing his bare feet at the same time.

'Bryan…', Hikari seemed to be quite upset with him ignoring her, 'Wake up, we have morning training session.'

'I wanna sleep…'

The overseer rolled her eyes and set eyes on his exposed feet. Getting a devilish plan in her head, she started tickling him there, hoping that the boy will wake up.

'And now?', she said triumphantly.

Bryan on the other hand fidgeted a little and rolled on his other side, curling up in a ball and covering himself almost completely.

'Let me sleep.', he ordered half awake and half sleeping.

The woman shook her head in resignation and placed fists on the both sides of her hips.

'Fine, if you don't wanna do that out of the goodness of your heart, we'll talk in other way.'

After that she hurriedly left the room leaving the sleeping boy as he was. After a few minutes she was back in his room and violently torn away the blanket from his body, stubbornly ignoring the boy's protests and spilled the water from the pot on his head.

The words couldn't describe how shrilling was his scream. Without a doubt, he managed to wake up half of the orphanage with that. Sitting on his bed, soaking wet on the top of his body, Bryan tried to find out what was going on. When he noticed his master standing next to his bed with a proud smile and holding an empty pot, the anger flew in his veins.

'Didn't I warn you? Don't make such face on me.', she sneered, playfully tilting head on the left.

'You gonna pay for that!', Bryan chaotically lounged at her and missed as she was faster than him.

Seeing he's not going to let her away, she started to run away from him. The boy chased after her as she predicted.

Some kids were slightly peeking from behind their doors to see what was that fuss all about.

Hikari swiftly jumped in the middle of the stairs on the flat space and speeded to the front door, successfully opening, as it was after 6 PM and the security man unlocked it while before.

'Come back here!', the boy growled behind her back.

'Then catch me if you can!'

Bryan ran out after her into the backyard. It was still slightly dark outside with only little trails of sun rays approaching. The overseer was far ahead from him, not looking tired in a slightest while he had to pause for a bit because he froze for a moment from the chilly air.

'What's up with you? If you're gonna stand there forever you'll never get me.', Hikari called him out in her own cocky way.

The boy shook his head and while taking a deep breath continued the chase after her. Another unpleasant thing was that the wet grass as it probably rained over night. With each steps he felt creeps that let go of him by the time he got warmed up. He didn't count how many rounds he managed to make around the building but he was tired enough so he could fall flat on his face. Which he actually almost did as one of his feet slipped on the puddle and fell on his butt.

Hikari stopped and turned behind her as she heard a splash. What she saw made her enough to burst out laughing. Bryan didn't look like much sitting in the puddle and huffing.

'Hey, you okay?'

He didn't say anything and when he tilted his head up, she noticed his raged and embarrassed face. His eyes were burning again though they seemed slightly more glossy than usually.

The woman slowly walked down to where he was and pulled out a hand before her gesturing him to take it and stand up.

He indeed stood up but without her help. He was clutching his dirty fists and looked down on his bare feet, resisting the urge to tremble from feeling cold.

Hikari sighed to herself and gently embraced him and caressed his wet back.

'There there, sorry I laughed at you.'

Bryan was still not saying anything and didn't even bother to hug her back or anything. He was frustrated, tired, cold and wet. All because of her stupid ideas.

'It wasn't funny. I'm freakin cold and messed up because of you.', he growled under his nose right before she opened her mouth to say something.

Taking more air into her mouth she made a pouty face and patted his head.

'I didn't tell you to run out on the sharp air barefoot with only your pajamas on.'

'You didn't? Who the hell spilled cold water on my head for whatever reason?', Bryan released himself from her grip and stomped the puddle furiously.

The woman made a funny face at him for a moment.

'You didn't want to wake up so I tried something else.'

'But it's six o'clock In the morning for crying out aloud! You're crazy to make me wake up at that hour.'

'You normally stand up shortly after seven so what's the point?'

'It's the whole one extra hour of my precious sleep, that is!', the boy was seriously angry as his muscles in his body were stained and ready to even start a fight, 'Why did you even want me to chase you?'

'Because I planned on making you run with me. You wanted some extended training so I thought you wouldn't mind. I always wake up around that hour to do some jogging and standard warming up exercises. Even in winter.'

Bryan couldn't think of anything else to say. He was partially angry at himself for letting him be a part of this hardship. He wasn't fond of the idea of running early in the morning and doing other things against his will.

'Don't tell me you've changed your mind.', Hikari shook her head and crossed arms on her chest, giving him one of her stern looks.

'I haven't! But you should have told me about that earlier! Stupid hag…', he muted the last two words so she wouldn't hear them while they'd still satisfy him.

Though it seemed that she still heard them.

'Jeez, you're a man, stop complaining over such minor things. Get a life! Didn't you want to be stronger, right?'

Bryan let out of his anger speak through his body and aimed for a punch at her which she, of course, successfully blocked. Being slightly surprised she made him want to fight her, she took his offer and delivered a single jab that he also defended just in time. Moving his shaky from the impact legs into a stance, he started punching her blindly with a cry which only made her disappointed.

Parrying them all she delivered a punch in his chest that sent him right into his knees.

'I told you, no blind pun-'

The boy positioned himself and swung his right leg in a semi round-house style, still being on the ground, which cut Hikari's legs down right where she was standing.

There was another hearable splash as it was her sitting in the puddle, blinking from astonishment. She didn't see that coming at all.

'Wow.'

Bryan got up and turned back to the orphanage without a word. He was still angry but at least he managed to make her fall into the puddle which satisfied him.

Hikari watched him go from the distance and not too long after that she felt creeps running through her body from sitting in the cold water.

'Damn it.', she muttered under her nose and stood up trying to wipe off the excess moisture from her clothes without success.

It was about the time when Bryan disappeared behind the front doors and she was left completely alone.

'That boy… He has the spirit of a fighter. ', she thought to herself and headed after him to prepare for the rest of the day.

* * *

Bryan was sitting in the middle of the class, trying to concentrate on English lesson when he sneezed aloud, disturbing the concentration. Some kids gave him a nasty look and one kid on his right slightly scooted out from him. Probably not to catch any virus.

'Bless you.', the teacher paused and looked slightly amused at him.

The boy swiftly rubbed off his runny nose with his sleeve and noticeably nodded his head.

'Sorry ma'am.'

'Stupid hag, she's gonna pay me for making me sick.', the boy thought to himself and glared evilly.

He was still fed up with Hikari. At least he didn't have math today so he could relax. He wasn't an ace in English either but the classes were somewhat more satisfying and less irritating. Mostly thanks to his teacher which was a young woman in her thirties, with blonde curly hair, kept cut only to her shoulders. Her sight was astute and calm at the same time, ready to swift into the glare when scolding a pupil. Even Milton had to behave in her class because it seemed that she wasn't interested into extra money. Dirty money.

Bryan glanced over his arm at the twins and concentrated all of his attention on the remaining lesson.

'… Before we finish, I'd like to tell you something.', she cleared her throat and closed the text book she was reading while ago, 'I guess you're tired with the grammar and orthography exams for all the time so I thought about something else.'

The kids looked at each other in with curiosity and started whispering.

'I'd like you to think about your future-'

This was when her pupils started to moan and shift uncomfortably in their seats.

'I know what you're all thinking, you still have some time before entering high school but this is more about writing about your dream job. I'm sure you've got your fantasies about the professions you'd like to do in the future. Just pick up one and write about it from your heart. Write the pros and cons and present it later in front of everyone in the class-'

Bryan rolled his eyes and let out a sad sigh. He was sure Milton would have another reason to attack the orphans upon hearing their dreams.

'This sucks.', he quietly murmured under his nose and rested himself on the desk.

'You don't have to rush on it. Just let me know about your decision next week. The actual essay is due holiday time. I highly encourage you to meet people working in your dream job, do the research and ask them things. I hope your parents and overseers from the orphanage will help you too.', the woman smiled, trying to bring the positive aura back.

She knew it was hard after giving them an assignment but it was her job after all. Before kids managed to whine some more about that, the bell rung and announced the end of the class.

Bryan peeked at Molly walking slowly over to the teacher. She seemed nervous too. Stretching lazily on the desk, he leaned his head closer to hear what was the fuss about.

'Ms. Smith?'

'Yes Molly?', the teacher gathered all of her papers together into one pile, ready to go.

'Do we really have to tell about our dream job in front of everyone in the class?', she shyly asked.

'Yes, that's how I'd like it to be… I know you're shy but you don't have to worry about anything. I'm sure you'll surprise me with your project.', the woman smiled and brought her belongings close to herself, 'Is that all?'

'Yes ma'am.', the girl quietly murmured and looked down.

'Chin up. I'm sure you'll do good. I believe in you.'

The boy watched her leave the classroom and riveted his attention back on his friend. He still didn't know why would she be nervous about this project. She's the best student in the group.

Right before he decided to talk to her he sneezed again and angrily slammed his face into the desk, dragging attention of the other students. The rest of the day was spent on planning the revenge on Hikari.

Because she angered him a lot, he didn't really show up for the training. On top of that, he got a headache and decided to spent the afternoon in him room, taking a nap.

* * *

The next day was slightly brighter and warmer. The half-Asian quickly marched through the corridors on exactly the same hour as before. Hoping the boy will be more eager to jog with her today, she entered his room quietly and glanced at his sleeping posture.

'Bryan, wake up. It's running time. You've slept enough. C'mon.', she walked over his bed and put hands on her hips.

There was no response from the boy aside furrowing his eyebrows in annoyance.

The overseer sighed. Having the idea he wouldn't get out easily, she decided to flick his nose playfully. Bryan yelped and shielded his mouth in defense, barely fidgeting or looking angry. He was quite apathetic compared to the day before.

Hikari paused for a moment. Something felt not right when she touched him. Brushing her fingers against his fringe, she noticed how his forehead was warm. He definitely had a fever.

He slowly sat on his bed and rubbed his nose against the sleeve, pretty much using it as the substitute of a tissue.

'What time is it…?'

'It's 6:15 AM but are you feeling alright?', the woman brought one of her hands to her forehead while she left another one on his, 'I think you have a temperature.'

'My throat feels itchy.', Bryan sniffed aloud and rubbed the snot off.

'Whooops…'

'It's your fault, you stupid hag.', the boy hoarse not really watching his mouth at this rate.

The overseer was about to snap at him for this remark but seeing him in such state, she couldn't bring herself to that. She felt partially responsible for this too.

'I'm sorry. I'll tell Ms. Evans to inform your headmaster about you staying at home and I'll bring you some medicine.'

'Can I just sleep?', he tiredly asked and coughed.

'Yes, you can. But remember to take the pills right after you eat the breakfast, okay?', Hikari examined him again.

'Yeah yeah…'

Bryan lied himself down again and closed his eyes. They were glossy and bear the signs of the pus in the corner of his eyelids. Putting the blanket over him tightly, she left the room silently.

Her special kickboxing training wasn't looking bright at that moment. Maybe she wasn't in position to be his mentor after all? Then it hit her, with her student being absent from the school she could finally put her plan into motion.

'Detective Grasland, on duty!', the woman sung in her head and happily stepped down the corridor.

* * *

It was the time where students headed back to their homes as the classes were called off. Her plan was to follow one of the Milton gang members and gather as much info as she could. Knowing only the team by the rough descriptions Bryan gave her and names, she wasn't sure if she manages to find the right boy. Not to mention that she needed to stay away from her colleague's sight too. Ms. Lee was the other overseer who was in charge of walking kids to the school and to pick them up on time. Occasionally she helped Hikari with taking care of the smaller kids at the orphanage.

Nobody knew about the fact that the woman decided to take the bullying case seriously. The pupils didn't know, Mr. Suarez didn't know, not even Mr. Richards who probably wouldn't be very happy if he ever found out. And if he did, shame on her.

She hid behind the fence on the corner of the alley where the schoolyard was. Exactly in the opposite way where the orphanage group was being taken home. That position gave her a perfect view on every student that left the gate without being necessarily spotted.

She saw many kids getting out but a particular one riveted her attention. It was an Asian-looking boy with a hoodie over his head, splitting up with a chubby friend with a fancy hairdo.

'Jackpot.', she whispered under her breath and quickly decided to get on moving rather than staying behind the fence, waiting for her 'suspect' to make the first step.

For her first target, she chose Chen. He seemed to be the easiest member out of the gang to talk to and aside his relationship with Milton, teachers couldn't say a bad thing about him.

Hikari wondered how he really is deep inside. What motives he had behind his actions. Every time he made a step, she made her one as well, obstinately tracking him down. Walking more crowded spaces she realized he's probably not going home. At least not directly.

After successful following, she saw a kindergarten building which threw her off the scent at first. Giving it more time, she noticed the boy entering the place and eventually coming out with a small girl being taken by her hand. The striking similarity between the two was enough to assume that they were siblings.

Their way to home was slightly weird to her taste. They would take small alleys and sneak into tight spaced instead of walking on the street. The two quickly evaporated behind the corner of some brick building. The woman assuming it's just a shortcut, took a step in and was greet with a swing of a metal pipe. Luckily enough it wasn't aimed directly at her.

'Who are you and why are you following us?', Chen yelled and took a combat pose while holding his beloved pipe tightly in his hands, pointing dangerously at her, 'What do you want from us?'

'Wow, chillax, I just…', she gulped but then the boy came closer.

'Leave me and my sister alone.'

Knowing that telling a lie in that kind of moment wouldn't do any good so she took a breath and looked into his dark eyes with as honest expression as she could muster.

'My name's Hikari Grasland, I'm the overseer at the orphanage where the Adams twins live. I wanted to talk.'

The Asian glared at her for a good moment but then lowered his weapon.

'If it's about what happened to Mandy, I've already said I'm sorry. Why would you come after me?', he asked cautiously and gulped.

'Because I wanted to talk with you not only about Mandy. I don't want to teach you a lesson or scold you. Really.'

Chen looked down for a moment and sighed with a resignation.

'Okay, Mei-Xing, you can stop hiding.'

The small girl stepped out from behind the trash bin and shyly walked towards to grab her brother's sleeve.

'Hi there. My name is Hikari.', the woman crouched down to see her face better and smiled.

'Hi Ms. Stalker . I'm Truong Mei-Xing.', she chirped and raised one of her hands in the meeting gesture.

'I'm not a stalker. Well… Kind of, but I didn't mean that-', the overseer scratched her head and stood up stretching a little, 'So where we can talk-?'

'Big bro, I'm hungry, let's go back home!', the kid persisted and jumped in place, making her ponytails flow in the air.

'Fine. Would you like to come with us Ms. Grasland?', the boy tossed the metal pipe away and took the girl's hand protectively.

'With pleasure.', the woman bowed.

Finally they made it to what seemed to be their home. The house wasn't big and it was connected to another one, making it a duplex kind of house. They had a small ginger pekingnese who welcomed them with a yelp. Hikari was sent to the main room where she just sat on the sofa and waited until the boy finished preparing the meal for his little sister.

Stepping out from the kitchen, he hung the apron on the doorknob and brought a tray with cookies on the table.

'I'm sorry, we only have these. I can prepare some Jasmine tea if you would like.'

'It's okay, you don't have to worry about.', the woman gestured him to sit down and grabbed one of the cookies, 'These are home baked, right?'

'Yeah. I baked them yesterday.', Chen rubbed his nose and looked away.

'They're really tasty.', she smiled and wolfed down another one.

'R-really? I'm glad to hear.', he blushed lightly from the embarrassment and played with his fringe nervously.

'Yeah so… Uh…', she took a glance on the room and then back at the kid, 'Where are your parents?'

'They work till the late hours so it's mostly me taking care of my sister and the home. ', he answered and reached out for a cookie.

'I see. So you cook and clean as well?'

'That's correct.'

'So… What is the reason you and your friends bully the orphans?'

The Asian stilled and gulped noticeably.

'Because it's fun. At least for us.', he quietly replied and looked down.

'But you know you're making them feel bad? Is there no way you could let them be?', she furrowed.

'I know. It was Milton's idea to harm them. He said orphans always get treated with an extra care and they slip away from the consequences when they make their sad eyes and whine about being alone. We're not orphans but some of us don't have a peaceful life and we're not having any privileges. ', Chen sniffed and rubbed his nose more furiously.

Hikari sighed and fixed her sight on the cookie tray. So now she kinda knew what was going on or at least she thought it could be a direct reason.

'So you joined Milton to bully the orphans because that's the only fun you're having? That's how you react to your parents not being around? Bullying them makes you feel you're making things even?'

The boy bit his lower lip and solemnly nodded in agreement.

'I see now. But did you know that orphans mostly want to live a normal life? Most of the kids I know didn't get to know their parents, some were abused in unimaginable ways and taken away here for their own safety. But they don't want to live under the 'orphan' label. Every orphan is just a normal kid, just like you. They have the same feelings. They struggle to be accepted and when you beat them only because they don't have a complete family, it really crushes them deep inside.', the woman paused and looked at him again, 'Imagine someone making fun of you because you're Asian and playing the role of a housewife. Would you like that?'

Chen shook his head silently.

'Sometimes you're powerless against what life brings such as race, sex, physical condition, material condition and more. You accept things as they are and yet you hope for something better. That's how it goes.'

'I know.', the boy quietly said and rubbed his nose again.

'Can you promise me, you would stop accompanying Milton?'

'I can try… I don't know else I could do to keep myself off all of this.'

'You must have some hobbies, right?'

'Yeah', Chen nodded and looked on the tray, 'I like baking cookies and such but my parents think it's pointless. They want me to become an engineer or a scientist to make more money.'

'I'm sure if you keep developing your passion, they'd accept you. After all I'm positive they'd like to have their son make pastries than getting letters from school.', she coughed and tried to smile afterwards.

'Yeah… Maybe, I could try.', he glanced at her shyly.

'That's the spirit!', she squeezed her fist mid air and made a motivational gesture.

The boy smiled back, feeling a little bit more encouraged than before.

'So what about the other friend? Eloy-boy?', Hikari asked and grabbed another cookie.

'Eloy… ', Chen looked down again, his smile disappearing almost as fast as it appeared, 'He's not exactly a lucky kid, y'know.'

'What's that about?'

'He lives with his dad who's very strict. Whenever I came to visit him, he nearly always wouldn't let me in. I'm sure he beats Eloy too.', he lowered his tone even more.

'What about his mother?', the woman eased up her expression and swallowed the treat.

'She left them when he was small. They don't see each other.'

Taking the last cookie, the overseer munched it down happily, never really distracting herself from her thoughts. This was when she stood up and turned at the boy.

'We're going to visit him. Can you tell me where he lives?'

'Yes but, I doubt he'd come outside to talk… Maybe yes if he's dad was not at home.'

'We'll never find out if we just sit here. Let's go.', she persisted and walked towards the entrance door to put the shoes back on.

'Alright. I'll call Mei-Xing to get ready. I don't want to leave her alone.', he answered and went for her.

'You're such a nice brother to her, aren't you?', Hikari beamed with smile which made Chen blush again upon hearing the praise.

The trio close the house safely and walked down exactly to the nearest bus stop. As Asian explained to the woman, Eloy lived in the suburb area, not exactly wealthy and safe one to begin with. It's not located near the school so he had to take a bus every time he wanted to go there. Heck, he had to take bus if he even wanted go anywhere else.

The bus ride didn't take too much of a time but waiting for the vehicle to arrive was irritating. When they finally got there, Hikari could see why the boy was reluctant to come here. The buildings were gloom looking almost like public housing which probably weren't too far from the truth. Wandering there alone at night would be a suicide. They heard a faint sound of the police sirens echoing from far away and the dogs crying and yapping.

Chen led the way right to the door of where the Gomez family lived. He rung the bell but before he suggested the woman and his sister to hide downstairs.

Nobody came out so they doubted anyone was even at home but the Asian persisted and rung the bell again in a specific code. After a while, the door opened with a squeaking noise and revealed the person behind.

'Sup Eloy. Can you talk?', he asked in a lower tone, still being afraid that his father might be right behind him.

'Yeah, he's still at work but I prefer we do that outside. ', the chubby boy answered and disappeared again.

The woman stole a glance from the stairs below, waiting for the any kind of sign from the boy. Mei-Xing mirrored her of course, thinking of it as of a great form of a play. Chen sent them a thumbup and grinned. This was going well.

Soon, the missing person left the flat and closed the door behind. He was quite surprised to see a totally stranger with his friend's little sister so he was confused until he learned about the situation he was called for.

When they found a secluded place to talk, Hikari straightly went through the same conversation she had before with the Asian.

'I was talking with Chen before about the orphans, could you please stop taking a part in it?', she calmly asked while peeking at Mei-Xing goofing around and dragging her brother behind.

'I don't know what I could say miss. I know we're the bullies but Milton gave us the right protection and a cause to live.', he answered while chewing on the bubble gum.

'A cause to live?'

'Yeah. At least I have a purpose. Orphans are scared of us and that's cool.', he made a balloon out of the gum and let it pop on his face.

The woman sighed and looked down. He was a completely different story compared to Chen.

'You feel better having someone scared of you because when you're back home, the table is turned?', she asked coldly but it sounded more like a statement.

'It ain't your business miss. I don't know what you're talking about.', he panicked but kept his cocky attitude.

'I'm talking about your bruise on your neck. Don't tell me you got it on the PE class. Unless one of the orphans had guts to jump on you and choked you-'

'Shut up!', he yelled at her and stood up, shaking furiously.

With each passing moment, his anger built in.

'You think that if you won't tell anyone about that, the problem will be non-existent? You're only making it worse for yourself. '

'I don't have any problem! I'm perfectly fine, mind your own business!'

'Then why are you hiding your bruises? They shouldn't be there if there was no problem. Care showing me your stomach or back?'

Chen petrified in a moment when he saw Eloy raising a hand, ready to hit the woman, he quickly covered his sister's eyes, prepared for the worse. But the hit never happened. The boy's fist was inches away from the woman's cheek, trembling and unable to move.

She didn't even shield herself as if she knew deep inside about the outcome.

'C'mon. Go ahead and hit me. It's so easy, isn't it? Your dad has no resistance when it comes to that, doesn't he?'

Eloy raised his hand again, ready to strike but was unable to deliver the hit this time as well. He just couldn't. Sitting back next to her he started to crack up.

'What's the matter?', she calmly asked once again.

'I can't. I can't hit anyone. I just can't. I don't know why..!', he covered his face and curled up protectively.

'Because you know how that hurts. You're the victim of your father. Making orphans your victims doesn't really help, right?'

He shook his head and sobbed quietly.

'That's why I'm asking you to stop. This is not getting you anywhere and aside from the little privilege of being feared in the Milton's shadow, it's slowly destructing you inside. I can try helping you with your abusive father if you want.', she offered him a hand and smiled as the boy glanced back at her through the wall of tears.

'How… How do you know all of those things? Why?', he asked and rubbed his eyes once again.

'That's a secret.', she giggled and kept the hand in offer in front of him.

Finally, Eloy took it and sobbed for the last time. Finally she was able to understand what was going on in the Milton's group. She doubted she'd be able to talk with him just like with his friends but having two people out of the group made him the only one to take care of now.

After helping the boy, she split up with Chen and his sister, thanking them before and decided to head back home. The sun was setting and she had her own business to work on.

* * *

When she returned back to the orphanage, she headed straight for her room to dress up and think about what she heard. She needed to develop the strategy against Milton, knowing that Mr. Suarez was too corrupted to help her. If it wasn't for Bryan, she wouldn't probably bother to do all of the things but she didn't regret that. When she opened her door, she didn't expect to see the boy lying on her bed, sleeping peacefully. The sight genuinely took her back as she didn't know what to do.

The woman carefully crouched next to him and stroked his forehead, mostly checking if the temperature was right. To her delight, he seemed to be fine now. Extra sleep and medicine worked well. The longer she watched him sleep the more couldn't she bring herself to wake him up.

It was only right to put a warm blanket over him and let the boy be. Leaving him alone, she went to the bathroom to change her outdoor clothes.

Bryan woke up a good while after she returned and was already working on something, doing orphanage reports and such. Hearing him shifting on the bed, she turned her head at him.

'I hope you slept well.', Hikari softly spoke and returned to her paperwork.

'Kinda. Where did you go?', the boy lazily asked and rubbed his sleepy eyes although slovenly as he had his boxing gloves on.

'Am I your guardian or are you mine?', she chuckled while she was filling some tables.

'I was curious. You weren't there for the training session.'

'You know, I've got some business to do outside. Orphanage work and such.', she quickly lied, trying not to sound surprised or nervous.

'I see…', he sniffed for a moment, feeling how his nose was itching.

'By the way, it's not exactly nice to waltz into my room without my pe-', she was cut in the middle of the sentence as the boy sneezed aloud, '…rmission.'

'I'm sorry.', Bryan murmured and rubbed his face clean on his sleeve and to her horror, boxing glove as well.

'Geez Bryan. Don't you have any manners?', the woman hurriedly walked over him and took out the tissue box from her bedside.

He didn't really answer her. Hikari sighed and gently brought one of the tissues next to his nose hole.

'Now, blow gently.', she ordered and gingerly wiped it clean, 'There we go.'

The boy squeezed his eyes tight when he was sneezing again and waited until she was done. Right after that she removed his boxing gloves and put them aside.

'What's the big deal with me rubbing my nose up against my sleeve anyway?', he narrowed his eyes in pout.

'You just don't do that. That's rude.', she replied sharply and begun to wipe the glove clean with some specific.

'Nobody seems to care. I could easily scratch the snot off once it dries out too-'

'I DO care.'

Bryan glanced at her and gulped. She sounded exceedingly cold when she was focused and collected. He noticed how patiently she's doing her task, even though the glove was all old and jagged up, she polished it as if it was something dear to her.

The boy remained silent until she was done and her expression eased back to normal.

'Why did you keep them? Aren't they old?', he sniffed and took it back on his lap.

'Yep, they're old. But they're somewhat important to me.', the woman smiled and looked softly at him.

'Why?'

'They once belonged to my mother.'

The kid almost immediately turned his head at her. He wouldn't have guessed her mom influenced her to train kickboxing or to have these in a first place.

'Your mom was also a kickboxer?', he asked with rising curiosity in his voice.

'Yep! A rising champion in fact.', Hikari grinned widely and tensioned her chest proudly.

'Wow, that's cool. I didn't know that. She inspired you to train as well?'

'You can say that. ', she giggled.

'She must be proud of you then. You're pretty good.', Bryan looked back at the gloves and put his leg over another as he was sitting next to her.

'I guess. I'm trying not disappointing her.'

'Where is she now?'

'She's dead. She died shortly after I was born.'

The boy glanced at his overseer and noticed her sad smile for the first time. The smile wasn't depressing, it was accepting things as they were. She had no place for regret in her heart anymore nor had the point to struggle with the reality.

On this very moment, he felt closer with his master. Losing his own mother made him realize and imagine what she's been through as well.

'I'm sorry.', he whispered shyly.

'It's okay. I'm fine. Even though she wasn't there for me, part of her is still inside of me.', Hikari grinned again, more brightly.

Bryan glanced at the ceiling and furrowed. The way she was talking about her mother made him perceive that he had a long way to go until he accepted the truth and moved on like she did. He kept the gloves closer to him and looked down on his feet again.

'If that gloves are special for you then why did you give them to me?'

'They're too small for me but for you they should be perfect, aren't they?', she smiled once again and glanced at his childish, growing hands, 'Besides, I'm sure they'll serve a better purpose when you will use them rather than if they were locked up in the box.'

'Sounds good to me.', the boy mirrored her expression and jumped off the bed, 'Do you know if they served the dinner yet? I'm hungry.'

Hikari paused and scratched her head in thought.

'I think it's after dinner time-'

'What? Why didn't you wake me up?', he furrowed in annoyance and snarled.

'Cause you were sleeping all sweet and nice.', she smiled weakly in her self defense and looked away.

'You are a stupid hag after all.', he muttered quietly under his nose just enough for her to hear that and get off the bed as well.

'What did you say?'

He sticked out a tongue at her and hurriedly left the room. Not letting him slip this time she went right after him.

Bryan thought he'd outsmart her by entering the man's toilet. Marching into his newfound 'safe base' he grinned triumphantly when he saw the woman standing inches before the entrance.

'What now? Nothing you can do, eh?', he lifted his head up in confidence almost like if he won a tournament.

Hikari calmly blinked and eyed him sternly for a few moments until she just walked in and dug her fist into the boy's head.

'That was clever, too bad it doesn't work on me.', she rubbed her fist furiously against his hair and then pulled him out the bathroom by his ear.

'Ow! Stop that!', Bryan yelped in pain and dropped the gloves he held on the ground just to shield himself from her.

'What should you say, hmmm?'

'Nothing! It's all your fault, leave me alone!', the boy managed to break free and sped up to his room, avoiding the stares of the orphans that were present on his way.

The woman shook her head in resignation and by collecting the gloves, she retreated to her own place. Knowing there's no point struggling with him and talking now, she decided to finish her work before calling a day.

For all the time she couldn't really fix her attention on the papers lying before her and was forcing herself to even sit on the chair behind the desk. Rubbing her eyes tiredly, she yawned aloud and lied her head on the pillow made out of her arms. With the corner of her eye she examined the wallpapers and the furniture. She noticed the covered photo frame and felt a tight knot in her stomach.

She decided to check if the boy was alright and to return the gloves. Remembering he was still probably hungry, if not asleep, she quickly raided one of her drawers where she kept some snacks.

Bryan tried to fall asleep but with so many thoughts in his head it was almost impossible. He wondered how he's gonna tackle his school project, what way to choose, if Molly would be okay and if he gets stronger.

He really wanted to be stronger. Both physically and spiritually. For himself and for the sake of other people to never see them suffering because he couldn't control the situation. He tucked the pillow right into his face to mumble some nonsense in spite of himself when he heard the doorknob moving.

Time to pretend he's asleep.

Hikari quietly stepped in and looked at him. She knew he might be pulling an act to her just to avoid any unnecessary conversation.

Squeezing his eyes tightly shut when he noticed her coming closer to him, he begged in his mind to have her go away. He was surprised to hear a swishing sound of the bag full of crisps landing next to his head. He also felt she placed something else besides snacks on his bedside.

When he thought she's done with him, she gently put the blanket over him with almost angel like patience and delicacy and placed her warm hand on his forehead, probably checking if he had the fever again.

He was still feeling dizzy and his throat was hurting him from time to time but overall he felt slightly better. He didn't really understand why would she care for him so much. After all he offended her and was aware of bringing her only troubles.

The overseer left his bed and turned the lights off just before she was about to leave.

'I'm sorry.', he murmured quietly, partially thanks to the darkness who made him feel more comfortable.

'Sleep well.', she replied to him and closed the door behind her.

She decided to wait until she heard him munching and with that, she could finally finish her own business.

-the tape gently fades away until it blackens out-


End file.
